The defense the Miami HEAT played in the first half of Game 1 barely looked like the defense that got them to 53 wins in the regular season much less the defense that got them to the Eastern Conference Finals.
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The Boston Celtics were coming off a tight turnaround from a Sunday afternoon Game 7. They were missing two starters in Marcus Smart, out with an injury, and Al Horford, ruled out hours before the game. And yet in those early quarters they were comfortable as ever. After the HEAT spent two series holding Trae Young and James Harden to a strictly outside-the-walls shot diet, Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown had little trouble getting into the middle of the floor. They would move the ball side to side, probing for the half-second seam that opens up as Miami’s gap-loading defense shift from one threat to another, and when the opportunity presented itself they pounced.
Again and again, Boston punched right through the teeth of the defense. Their 126.5 Offensive Rating in the first half was the second-highest allowed by the HEAT during the playoffs and among the ten-worst surrendered during the regular season. Boston’s 42 points in the paint, the exact points Miami’s entire defense is designed to prevent, were the most against the HEAT in the first half in any game since 2012.
“That was almost record setting what they were doing to our defense in the first half in terms of getting into the paint and breaking us down,” Erik Spoelstra said.
The problem was twofold. Not only was Boston scoring with ease, which has the obvious effect of lots of points going on the board in a game decided on who has the most points, their efficiency was keeping Miami’s offense in a box. Every time the ball went through the net on one end meant Boston’s typically sharp defense was able to run back and get set. A HEAT offense that doesn’t often thrive in a halfcourt setting had nowhere to go but a 24-second grind. It’s a dangerous feedback loop to try and survive in. That Miami was down just eight points at the break – thanks to Jimmy Butler, incredible again with 41 points, and Tyler Herro shouldering the scoring burden – was a minor victory in itself.
Then the third quarter hit, one that featured the rare one-two combo of a 22-2 run to open and a 17-3 run to close. It wasn’t just the quarter that won the game thanks to a 39-14 margin, it was a proof of concept for the entire series, the blueprint for how Miami can punch their ticket to the next round.
It started, as it often does – as it often has to – with this team, with the defense. As they repaired the shell around the paint meant to deter all comers at all costs, Boston scored just six points in the paint after the break. Boston drives, worth 1.04 points-per-drive in the first half including assist opportunities, declined sharply in value to 0.65 points-per-drive. Miami didn’t just come out of the break executing better, with players in the right spots adhering to Spoelstra’s scheme, they were simultaneously ferocious and loose. The former in the sense that they were just as quick-footed on first rotation as on the third and fourth. The latter in the sense that they played with such confidence as to break the defensive rules when the possibility of making a play was at hand.
“[We] started guarding,” P.J. Tucker said. “Started taking pride in getting kills. At the end of the day that's what it comes down to. It's having the right coverage, being aggressive, staying in front of, moving feet, not fouling, doing all of that. You have multiple efforts. It's the Conference Finals. Can't just do one thing. [It’s] two, three, four, five things, in a single possession sometimes, whatever it takes. We finally got that effort in the second half.”
This time, if Robert Williams rolled to the rim to create a lob angle for Tatum, Tucker seamlessly switched downhill and, with backside help at the ready, shut the passing window with the swiftness.
This time, if Robert Williams did get a touch in the paint, there was 6-foot-3 Gabe Vincent – setting a career-high with three blocks that all could have easily been categorized as steals – collapsing into the paint hands at the ready to save points.
Boston scored 1.09 points-per-direct-screen in the first half, which factors in all of the drop-offs to Williams. In the second half, with Bam Adebayo simultaneously pressuring and containing the ball like few others can, that number was 0.61.
“We contained the ball at the point of attack a little bit better,” Spoelstra said. “To say that you can do that mano y mano without any help is totally unrealistic. It has to be a team defense. You have to get in the gaps. You have to rotate. You have to make multiple efforts.”
This time, it was the Celtics on their heels. And teams on their heels make mistakes. Miami had already made their run through the first six minutes of the quarter, throwing down the UNO reverse card to take an eight-point lead after trailing by eight at the break, but it was a normal run. The sort of run you expect a good team at home to make. What transformed a normal run into a gamebreaker was a 45-ish-second sequence in the middle of the quarter, one that is better seen than described.
Offense begets halfcourt situations for the defense, defense feeds the offense transitions. Miami played in transition 19.6 percent of the time in Game 1, which was their fifth-highest mark of the season.
“Being able to get half-court stops and then being able to run in transition,” Bam Adebayo said. “We want to live like that.”
Miami’s halfcourt offense was better than expected in this one, with their 112.2 halfcourt points-per-play falling far north of above-average. After spending time adjusting to the length, speed and precision of Boston, Herro arrived for his first shift and immediately began hunting pockets of space with Robert Williams in drop coverage. The Celtics are an incredible switching team, but the HEAT found success having Butler or Adebayo or P.J. Tucker either slip into the middle of the floor mid-switch or seal off one defender and take him on a roll to the rim. They manufactured two-on-the-ball situations against a team built around avoiding them. As Boston made a final run down the stretch, Butler relentlessly hunted Payton Pritchard as the Celtics did everything they could to avoid that one particular switch. It was as good a start as Miami could ask for with regards to their halfcourt execution.
It’s also not going to get any easier. Boston should get Smart and Horford back sooner than later, and they have plenty of obvious items to clean up between games. There are going to be some ugly nights for both sides when it comes to scoring the ball, and that’s why quarters like the third are going to be so crucial. Every moment in the open floor will be a moment of freedom.
“You have two really good defenses and you're looking for any kind of advantages in the margins,” Spoelstra said. “Whatever we're saying, I guarantee they are saying it.”
If you think about it too hard you’ll fall into a chicken or the egg paradox. We can ask if the Feedback Loop of Prosperity begins with the defense feeding the offense transition opportunities or with the offense providing the defense with makes that force the other team into the halfcourt and we can go back and forth until the galaxy collapses into itself. Both are true. Both are critical. Miami scored 1.18 points-per-possession off defensive rebounds or steals against 1.12 points-per off made shots or free-throws, a significant gap though a smaller one than we’ve seen from them during the regular season. But on the other side Boston’s efficiency fell from 1.41 points-per-possessions after a rebound or steal to 1.00 following makes.
The more Miami fed the beast, the more Boston’s starved. If both teams play to their best selves for every minute of this series, who knows what would happen, but that scenario is impossible because the Vitruvian best self in this case can only be obtained in a manner that prevents the other side from also doing so. There is no give without the take.
If you’re Boston, a team that can also get stuck in the mud, you come away from that game thinking that the first step would be to stop tripping over our own feet, stop handing over points by the bushel – they also had some truly dreadful fouls – and make the HEAT earn it in the halfcourt. As they get healthier, they’ll be able to switch more easily. The HEAT are going to get flattened out at times. That much will be unavoidable. There are adjustments and tweaks and edits on deck and nothing seen in Game 1 did much to dissuade the notion that this should be a long, great series.
Each side had their moments. Boston won three quarters. The HEAT dominated one, in a similar manner to how they thoroughly controlled the fourth quarters of the 2020 Eastern Conference Finals. It was the way they owned that one period, the way every aspect of their game temporarily coalesced into something more, that will have to sustain them during coming periods of famine.
At long as they’re defending like they can, a feast is always around the corner. And the beast is always hungry.