Heat's Jimmy Butler -- Exchange with Grant Williams fueled me in Game 2 win - ESPN

BOSTON — Miami Heat star forward Jimmy Butler has spent his life overcoming people who have slighted him, so it should come as no surprise that in the heart of a hard-fought 111-105 victory over the Boston Celtics in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference finals on Friday night, Butler made forward Grant WIlliams pay for talking trash to him.

The pivotal sequence of the game came midway through the fourth quarter after Williams drained a 3-pointer to give the Celtics a 96-87 lead with 6:37 left. On his way back down the floor, Williams began jawing with Butler, who proceeded to smile and then responded by hitting his next shot and getting fouled by Williams for a three-point play.

After the basket, Butler immediately got head-to-head with Williams as the pair exchanged words and were each assessed a technical foul. From that point, the Heat closed the game on a 24-9 run and left Boston with a stunning 2-0 lead in the series. Butler admitted that the exchange got him rolling down the stretch.

«Yes, it did,» Butler said. «But that's just competition at its finest. He hit a big shot, started talking to me. I like that. I'm all for that. It makes me key in a lot more. It pushes that will that I have to win a lot more. It makes me smile. It does. When people talk to me, I'm like, OK, I know I'm a decent player, if you want to talk to me out of everybody that you can talk to. But it's just competition. I do respect him, though. He's a big part of what they try to do. He switches. He can shoot the ball. I just don't know if I'm the best person to talk to.»

Butler, who scored nine of his team-high 27 points following Williams' initial words, once again showed why he has been arguably the best player in the postseason by making clutch