INDIANAPOLIS — The coveted NBA championship, the one LeBron James needs to validate everything, was vanishing.
With 18,000 towel-waving fans roaring like an engine over at the Indianapolis Speedway, the Indiana Pacers had knocked the Miami Heat to the floor and to the edge of elimination.
James didn’t panic. He simply picked up his teammates and carried them to a win. And this time, Dwyane Wade helped.
James scored 40 points, grabbed 18 rebounds and also had nine assists, and Wade added 30 points — 22 in the second half — as Miami rallied to even its semifinal series against Indiana with a 101-93 win Sunday over the Pacers, who had the defending Eastern Conference champions down but couldn’t keep them there.
“I felt like I had to do what- ever it took to win,” said James, who played all but four minutes.
With all-star forward Chris Bosh injured and back in Florida, the James-Wade tag team saved the Heat, which will host Game 5 on Tuesday night at American Airlines Arena.
“Me and ‘Bron had it going,” said Wade, who bounced back from the worst playoff game of his NBA career — five points on 2-of-13 shooting — with one of his best. “We played off each other very well. We both were aggressive at the same time.”
The Heat now heads home back in control of the best-of-seven series, which is down to a best-of-three set with two of the games on Miami’s court.
“It’s still going to be a dogfight,” James said.
Udonis Haslem, playing with a large bandage covering a nasty cut over his right eye that required nine stitches, added 14 points for Miami.
For a while, the Heat’s season was slipping away.
The Pacers had a 10-point lead in the third quarter and were threatening to run away as they did in Game 3, when James and Wade took over. They scored 38 consecutive Miami points in one stretch bridging the second and third quarters and combined to score 28 of Miami’s 30 in the third when the Heat seemed to be playing with two to Indiana’s five.
“LeBron had that look,” Heat forward Shane Battier said. “And when he has that look and Dwyane has that look, you want to run through a wall.”
Danny Granger scored 20 and Paul George added 13 to lead the Pacers. Center Roy Hibbert, so dominant at both ends in Game 3, had only 10 points and was in foul trouble during the second half.
Spurs vs. Clippers •LOS ANGELES — Late game.
