The Washington Wizards narrowly bested the Atlanta Hawks 103-101 to take a 2-1 lead in the Eastern Conference semi-finals on Saturday.
Washington played without All-star point guard John Wall for a second consecutive game because of a broken left hand.
But the Wizards still took a 21-point lead with less than 10 minutes left.
Paul Pierce had 13 points and banked-in the game-winner to help short-handed Washington with the win.
Pierce said he just wanted to stop Atlanta from stealing the win in the dying seconds of the game.
"I wanted to make sure I got the shot off with no time on the clock. You know, I've been in those situations many a times. And so we didn't want to, you know, if it went overtime or if I missed the shot, we didn't want them to have a chance to call timeout and advance the ball. So I just took my time, got to my spot and I was able to knock it down."
Game 4 is Monday at Washington.
