NBA Playoffs

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Couper Moorhead

In the first half of Game 1, the Cleveland Cavaliers were getting just about anything they wanted. Their Shot Quality – Second Spectrum’s statistic which offers an expected effective field-goal percentage based on shot location and how contested it is – of 59.9 was the highest Miami has allowed any first half this season and the sixth most any team that made the playoffs allowed before halftime. Dunks, layups, open threes, you name it, they were creating it.

Yes, there’s an adjustment period coming off the Play-In Tournament. Not just the lack of rest and prep time, but the dramatic upshift in quality of opponent. One of the highest first-half Shot Quality numbers Miami allowed in 2023 was in Game 1 of the NBA Finals, Denver’s style of Nikola Jokic ball a shock to the system after three rounds of Eastern Conference competition.

And adjust they did. In the second half, Cleveland’s Shot Quality dropped all the way to 48.8, the third lowest Miami has allowed in any second half. They still made a ton of shots, enough to post the highest Offensive Rating of any HEAT opponent this season, because they’re a team full of tough shot makers and Ty Jerome decided he was going to take the wheel and not let go, but the HEAT had still dragged Cleveland down into something at least resembling the muck – the game was the second-slowest of Miami’s season – they want to force teams to play in. There may be some traction there, even if Cleveland has the talent to play just about any style.

Of course, the scratched and scarred side of that coin is that even as they managed to pull Cleveland into their vortex of questionable angles, Miami’s Shot Quality, third lowest of their season, was steady in its toughness. &nbsp;Against as team as explosive as the Cavaliers, fresh off one of the most efficient regular seasons in league history, trying to tough-shot your way to four wins is akin to trying to fend off a horde of vampires with little but a jar of pickled garlic and the power of the blues. There are only so many deep dribble and fadeaway jumpers you’re going to hit.

The good news is there are some clear avenues toward upping the quality, though it may be an imbalanced task.

Beneath those complicated Shot Quality numbers are basic counting totals. The HEAT only took five attempts in the restricted area in the series opener. That is by design, both in how Cleveland defends generally – they allow the ninth fewest halfcourt rim attempts in the league, fewer with some combination of Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen on the floor – and how they’re choosing to defend Miami specifically. The HEAT already take the sixth lowest percentage of their shots at the rim, with a ton of upper paint looks, which led to 39 non-rim two pointers in Game 1 as Cleveland sought to keep the HEAT’s shooters off the arc. More on that in a bit.

Miami also only took seven corner threes in Game 1, well under the 11.2 Cleveland typically allows per 100 possessions and the 11.8 Miami usually takes. Therein lies opportunity.

Cleveland is both a big and small team at the same time. Their frontline is massive and they added wing size in a midseason trade for De’Andre Hunter, but they also play a number of smaller guards that can be targeted for acquirable mismatches that the switch-heavy Cavaliers will allow. Coming into this series, that was one area where Miami could gain an edge with Bam Adebayo and Andrew Wiggins using their size on the blocks.

Sure enough, Miami’s first possession of the game was Wiggins in the post against Donovan Mitchell. That sequence ended in a traveling call, but it was almost beside the point as we got a quick glimpse of Cleveland’s help scheme – one that was consistent with everything they did during the regular season.

Watch Jarrett Allen sliding into help position here first, but then watch it again and keep your eyes on Darius Garland and Max Strus helping into the paint.

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Corner Key: Wiggins Post Strongside

Notice who was sitting in the weakside corner, ready for what would have been one of his cleanest looks of the night? Tyler Herro.

That’s hardly an easy pass to make. The players who can consistently, on time and on target, skip the ball to the weakside corner are, for the most part, the best playmakers in the league. That’s Cleveland’s gambit with their system, flooding the zone and crowding the strong side. The helper takes away rim possibilities, the guys helping the helper cut off the initial passing options. What happened on Miami’s first possession was hardly a one off. Make or miss, it became the standard.

“Offensively we need to be more efficient,” Erik Spoelstra said. “Our spacing, some of our actions, doing it with more purpose and intent. Getting the ball to Tyler, [Andrew Wiggins], Bam [Adebayo] in their strength zones is always a priority. They were doing things to try to stop us from doing that. That’s the playoffs.”

Keep your eyes on that weakside corner, and the space at the top of the arc depending on which passing lanes Cleveland prioritizes.

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Corner Key: Cleveland Strongside Help

“They were keeping us on the side of a lot of their stuff,” Spoelstra said. “That’s their defensive system against us. It’s up to us how to figure out how to get in a flow and get the ball where it needs to go, that’s what we’ll work on the next couple of days.”

One caveat before we continue. Allen and Evan Mobley are aggressively helping off both Bam Adebayo and Kel’el Ware when they’re outside spacing on the arc. Cleveland’s scheme is their scheme, but especially against Miami’s two-big lineups they’re leaving the biggest players on the floor open. While Adebayo attempting to counter this at times with some timely cuts, this is where we really learn whether the spacing with those alignments allows for enough grease on the wheels.

Back to the point at hand. Miami averaged 19.8 corner touches per 100 possessions this season, third most in the league, producing 1.10 points per on those. Cleveland allows 18.6 corner touches, eighth most.

In Game 1, the HEAT only had 16 corner touches. They didn’t score very efficiently on those due to some make-or-miss, some decision making, but that can easily be turned around.

It wasn’t that the HEAT were unaware that the weak corner was open. Again, it’s a tough pass to make and Cleveland’s help isn’t static. Postseason offense is not a connect the dots affair. You only have a second or two at most to drop a pinpoint pass into a specific timing window.

But when you do, it creates some of the best offense of the night.

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Corner Key: Hitting Weak Corner

There’s certainly more Miami can do across the board to solve the possession game – they took eight fewer shots, had six more turnovers, allowed three more offensive boards and lost out on multiple fifty-fifty balls – but it’s going to be tough sledding if Cleveland is going to take 12 more threes than them (43 to 31, with both teams shooting 41.9 percent from deep) in each game this series. The corners are ripe for the picking, as are the spots in the slot and up top if the last weakside defender shades too far one way or another, and corner threes are always a boon to shot quality.

Then there’s Herro. Remember that first possession, where Herro was open in the corner? Herro only had one corner touch all game, his overall frontcourt touches down to 42 from a regular season average of 57. While Herro was able to brute force a score against Allen on a switch in the second quarter and earned a couple open threes on Cleveland breakdowns – Max Strus slipping as he recovered off a screen – he was generally seeing two or three bodies, driving lanes properly pinches and switches at the ready, whenever he tried to run offense. When teams load up on him, good teams that Herro can’t regularly fool with screen rejections and fakes, the solution has often been to move him off the ball and free him up from there, his pick-and-rolls down to 22 in Game 1 off a regular season average of 35.

It hasn’t always been easy to have Herro off the ball in the second half of the season with Miami’s other ballhandling and playmaking options, Herro forced to lean into his ultra-efficient upper paint game as he’s run off the line by pressure, but Cleveland took things one step further in entering nearly full ball denial mode in the second half. If Herro was anywhere near the ball or the ball was one pass away, Herro had a defender in his face. It wasn’t quite a box-and-one, but it wasn’t too far off.

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Corner Key: Herro Faceguard

“They were really disruptive denying me the ball, making sure there was always a body on me, nothing really easy,” Herro said.

“I’ve been getting guarded like this all season,” he added a couple days later. “We’ve figured it out already.”

The only time Herro had a bit more space, at least in the frontcourt, was when he was on the weakside. And that’s where we return to Cleveland’s scheme. If Miami can hit enough of those skip passes, the passes that are the Achilles heel of any defense that brings multiple bodies into the paint – Miami’s similarly structured defense sometimes struggles with big playmakers like Nikola Jokic, Luka Doncic and LeBron James for the same reasons – then they’ll not only be able to generate more catch-and-shoot threes, but afford Herro a little more breathing room. That doesn’t mean Herro needs to be sitting in the weakside corner all game. In addition to the usual counters such as using Herro as a screener – Herro only set three screens in Game 1 – he’s one of the HEAT’s best at hitting the opposite corner. The skip pass is merely the best and most direct path towards getting Cleveland into full rotation. And once a defense is in rotation, space is no longer at a premium if the ball remains a step or two ahead.

“Getting him in open space,” Adebayo said when asked about getting Herro cleaner touches. “Getting him to where he can be himself without a whole bunch of bodies in front of him.”

Plenty else that Miami can do on defense, especially in protecting Herro – he was involved in 20 pick-and-rolls as the ballhandler defender, third most this season, and an additional 18 pick-and-rolls as a screener defender, also third most for him this season – and tightening the screws on the driving lanes so Mitchell and Garland and Jerome aren’t making as many plays in the middle of the floor. But Cleveland was also able to play three-guard lineups down the stretch, lineups that make it easier to involve other guards in any action, because the HEAT’s offense couldn’t take advantage of mismatches.

The weakside corner, and the top of the arc as part of the same sequencing, might be the key.

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The Corner Key: Quantity Leads To Quality, And Space For Tyler Herro, As The HEAT Head Toward Game 2

1. There’s nothing like Game 1’s, especially those that kick off a series that, as this Miami-Cleveland matchup is, mostly a blank slate. Two teams with little history with one another, everything to learn from the first 48 minutes.

While the regular season series wasn’t worth much due to the rosters that were available in each game, one constant was that Miami did not get to the rim very often against not only Cleveland’s two-big lineup, but their switching and willingness to help in the paint. Little traction in the halfcourt in the opening minutes, Miami trying to get Andrew Wiggins in the post against one of Cleveland’s guards and the Cavaliers being ready with plenty of help. A 9-2 Cleveland advantage as Donovan Mitchell drove down the right wing for a dunk.

Miami fought back, jumpers falling as they almost always seem to for them in the earlier minutes. Before long it was a one-point game, the HEAT even jumping out in front with an 8-0 run on the back of a Tyler Herro three. But with Cleveland getting the looks they want – Darius Garland hitting a couple of the few looks they didn’t want – the Cavs held a 31-24 advantage after one, 18 points in the paint with Miami still looking for their first halfcourt rim attempt.

Offensive rebounds started to hurt in the second period, as did turnovers, Cleveland’s lead reaching as many as 16. Herro (leading all first-half scorers with 17) eventually got going downhill for a couple floaters, defenders still crowding him at the arc when the ball was in his hands, and with Miami hitting 9-of-18 from the arc they closed the half on a 12-4 run to make it 62-54 even as they trailed 28-18 in the paint. The Shot Quality edge favored Cleveland at that point, Miami’s turn to find answers for Cleveland’s defensive squeeze pushing the ball into the mid-range.

Standstill through the first few minutes of the third, Miami still keeping pace from the arc up to 10-of-20, Cleveland with an answer for every make, those answers coming in the paint more often than not as their Offensive Rating hovered just below 140.

Still only a seven-point game, Adebayo and Herro doing everything they could do, though Cleveland had their hands on the wheel. Miami in their zone out of a timeout, forcing a couple misses to give Duncan Robinson the chance to bring them back within eight. Cavs up, 87-79, going into the fourth.

More zone to open the fourth, Cleveland’s paint attack slowed as Adebayo kept Miami hanging around with jumpers from all over. But again the Cavaliers had answers, Ty Jerome making a name for himself in the postseason as the zone was countered with a shooter-heavy lineup – Isaac Okoro had missed a series of open corner threes – and as a couple threes fell they were back up 12.

The lead went the wrong direction from there, Jerome still hitting even as Davion Mitchell offered up Miami’s best stretch of paint attacks. By the time Garland beat the shot clock with a three off a fingertip tip-out from Mitchell, the lead was 19 with two to play and the night was just about through. Round One to the No. 1 seed as Cleveland takes it, 121-100.

2. On one hand, the final score does not reflect just how much Miami was in this game, only a seven-point deficit to overcome with just over eight minutes to play. Before Ty Jerome had one of the best quarters of his life, on his way to 28 points on 15 shots, Adebayo (24 point on 22 shots) had the steady hand and the zone had Cleveland stalled out for a brief stretch.

On the other hand, Cleveland’s 139.1 Offensive Rating is tied for the highest Miami has allowed all season.

There were good moments. After a series of Donovan Mitchell (30 points on 19 shots) drives Miami did tighten up their paint defense, allowing very little at the rim the rest of the way. That the difference in paint points only finished 48-44 was in the HEAT’s favor after the gap had been in the double digits for most of the night, and though the HEAT did make up some ground with late Davion Mitchell (18 points on 12 shots) drives once the game was mostly out of reach, keeping that Cleveland number below 50, with Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen only combining for 21 on 15 shots, is something to work with.

Still, it was a good shooting night wasted (41.9 percent), matched by Cleveland to the decimal point while the Cavaliers attempted 12 more from the arc. Miami finished with only five attempts in the restricted area overall, Cleveland’s defense pushing them into 44 combined upper paint and mid-range jumpers and their willingness to help disrupting any matchup hunting Miami was able to get to as they aimed to take advantage of Cleveland’s switch-heavy scheme.

Altogether, there are reasons for Miami to be encouraged in the context of a 21-point loss, but Cleveland was the best offense in the league during the regular season and it’s tough to make the case that they were ever too uncomfortable, even with some of Jerome and Garland’s tougher makes down the stretch, as they finished with only eight turnovers.

3. Herro did not have a bad game with 21 points on 17 shots, though he did have four turnovers to two assists, but as expected coming into the night it was clear he was at the very top of Cleveland’s scouting report. If the ball was near Herro, he was often getting faceguarded. If he had the ball, he was being pressured above the arc with Mobley and Allen ready and willing to switch if the need was there. And when Miami tried to run him off the ball on the weakside, Cleveland did well to account for him in their rotations.

After a good second quarter, there was very little airspace for Herro in the second half (Miami scored 46 after the break) to not only operate but to even get a clean catch as he took four shots in the third and just two in the fourth.

Adebayo had his mid-range game working and Mitchell provided some supplemental offense to help keep Miami’s offense above water, threes helping everywhere else, but as Herro has become the driving force of the HEAT’s offense, their most steady source of creation alongside Adebayo, the most top of mind storyline for the next couple of days will be how best to find him room to work. In a regular season game, all of Miami’s threes might have accomplished that, but Cleveland clearly had gameplan discipline, not overreacting to any of the HEAT’s bursts of scoring. Maybe the scoring of Adebayo or Mitchell could force a reaction going forward, but the onus is typically on the team that lost the most recent game to make the adjustments.

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Coup’s Takeaways: Ty Jerome Runs Away With Fourth Quarter As HEAT Drop Game 1

The Boston Celtics lead the series, 1-0, with Game 2 coming up Wednesday at 7 pm before things shift to Miami for Game 3 Saturday at 6pm.

The Boston Celtics took Game 1 of this First Round series in decisive fashion, leading wire-to-wire and by more than 30 for a stretch. But as is so often the case with series openers, the final score is far less instructive than the tape. There’s no doubt Miami is fighting an uphill battle in this series, especially without Jimmy Butler and Terry Rozier and with Duncan Robinson (15 minutes) limited, but for all of Boston’s offensive firepower it’s how they’re choosing to defend Bam Adebayo and Tyler Herro that may be the most interesting early notes.

The story of the past couple months for Miami has been more and more teams following the examples set by teams like Dallas and New York and their defensive schemes, either sending doubles at Adebayo and Jimmy Butler or loading up early help on their post-ups and isolations across the lane. Some of what made those tactical decisions was the sometimes awkward spacing with Adebayo and Butler on the court together, but the Celtics have rarely schemed the HEAT in such a fashion, opting for years to trust their individual defenders while staying home everywhere else as much as possible.

As expected, they’re treating Adebayo much as they always have. Boston will bring a third player into the lane to ensure he doesn’t get a free roll to the rim, but with both Kristaps Porzingis and Al Horford in drop coverage the Celtics appear willing to concede the occasional pocket pass at the elbows or on the baseline out of an empty-corner set. Most crucially, on Adebayo’s one-on-one forays, either isolations or post-ups which often end up being the same things logged differently in various databases, there is no help coming. Adebayo attacking Horford looks the same as it did two years ago, and the same is true of the Porzingis matchup.

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Celtics Game 1: Bam Single Coverage

“I came into the game being aggressive,” Adebayo said. “That’s it. If you’re not going to double me, I’m going to try and go score.”

It’s important to note that these are not bad matchups for Adebayo. His repertoire – every pivot and fake and spin and reverse you can imagine – has evolved to the point where he can create a look against most anyone. He’s scored on both defenders before, and he can do it at volume – he produced a respectable 10 points on 10 combined isolation and post-up possessions in Game 1, per Second Spectrum’s tracking data. They are also inherently static possessions, the rest of the Boston’s defense locked in on their men, and Adebayo’s comfort zone is more in the upper paint than in consistently getting right to the rim against defenders with size playing a foot or two back.

Why this might be so crucial in this series is because of how much more Miami requires shot creation from Adebayo without other on-ball options in Butler and Rozier. In the past, with Butler soaking up postseason-level usage, Adebayo could shoulder the burden for bursts, going at Horford for four straight minutes in a third quarter on the road, a change-of-pace to keep the offensive train on the tracks. But with injuries being what they are and Miami’s creation options depleted as a result, more is required. Using Sunday’s numbers as an example, a point-per-possession while you’re trying to hold a lead late in a game is different than a point-per-possession when you’re down double digits and the offense has already been pushed off the arc and away from the rim.

“I have a lot of thoughts on that end,” Erik Spoelstra said. “You have to give them credit for taking us out of some things. I think they’re willing to live with some of those one-on-ones to be able to keep bodies on some of our other guys.”

The question, then, is how efficient Adebayo will have to be with his one-on-one work to force an adjustment from Boston, or if that limit even exists. Boston didn’t bring a ton of doubles this season, but they weren’t bottom of the league. If Adebayo scores on five straight isolations at some point in this series, will Boston change its coverage, even if only temporarily? Any avenue toward tilting the defense, any option for getting two defenders on the ball, is one worth exploring, but it’s also difficult to spend long stretches searching for those answers when you need immediate production as you try and keep up with a dynamic offense.

One positive in all of this is that if Miami can force clutch minutes in this series, Boston’s predilection for single coverage means Adebayo should have straightforward shot creation opportunities available to him in moments when any good, comfortable shot has greater value – when single-shot percentages can carry more weight than big picture efficiency. If Adebayo has the opportunity to create and take two ~45 percent shots to take a lead in the final minute of a playoff game against a 64-win team, that’s something everyone would probably be happy with. Whether or not Boston would change their first, second and third quarter philosophies in those situations remains to be seen.

On the other side of the high-usage coin is Herro, who has the unenviable task of being the lead ballhandler going up against a team replete with strong individual defenders. As Herro does not lean toward one-on-one play as heavily as his All-Star teammates – he uses about a quarter as many isolations as Butler, half as many as Adebayo – Boston’s core scheme is more about the pick-and-roll game.

Here's the stat to know. In Game 1 Herro ran 20 pick-and-rolls and 10 handoffs. Of those 30 actions, he only shot the ball, turned the ball over a total of nine times, about a 30 percent usage rate, down from a 40 percent usage rate on his own actions during the regular season. Some of that is Herro having more playmaking responsibility with who is currently available, some of that dealing with two guards, in Jrue Holiday and Derrick White, who double as two of the best screen navigators in the league. When your defender can consistently skinny up and around picks and is always on your tail, it’s tough to find comfortable space.

But Herro has seen defenders like these before, and he’s certainly seen drop coverage like this before. No matter how well Holiday and White are fighting through screens, Adebayo is a good enough screener to create space for Herro to get into the space created by the coverage. If that’s all it was, Herro would be able to get to the same shots he was getting in last week’s Play In games against Philadelphia and Chicago.

Boston, however, isn’t defending Herro’s pick-and-rolls two-on-two as a team like Milwaukee would have done in the past. While they’re staying home on Adebayo’s isolations and post-ups, there’s a clear third defender pinching in at the elbow, not always to get in front of the ball but to be enough of a nuisance to force Herro to pick it up, turning what could have been a shorter floater, or even a layup, into a tight window for a long jumper.

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Celtics Game 1: Herro Third Man

It’s a similar idea to how Miami defends so many guards, with their coverage of Trae Young in the playoffs a couple seasons ago a well-known example. Boston’s intention, then, appears to be to make Herro more of a playmaker, Adebayo more of a scorer.

“[They were] just applying pressure and making things difficult,” Herro said. “Not allowing me to get comfortable really from the beginning.”

Whether or not Spoelstra and his staff are happy to live with what Boston is happy to give up remains to be seen. Miami had less than two days between their win-or-go-home game against Chicago Friday and an afternoon game Sunday in Boston, so with a couple days off before Wednesday’s matchup they’ll have the opportunity to reassess. For now it’s only important to note how Adebayo and Herro are being defended within the context of who is available, because whether or not those coverages change could define both this series and the developmental tracks for both players moving forward.

We had a pretty good idea going into this one that Boston was going to be a tough team to zone. They almost always have five good-to-great shooters on the floor, for one, but they also don’t panic against the coverage, avoiding most of the pratfalls which plague other teams. There’s a reason Miami only used their change-of-pace scheme for 15 possessions across three games with Boston.

But zone has been Miami’s primary look when Adebayo rests, their way of keeping the ball out of the paint while they capitalize on the five-out spacing provided by Kevin Love on the other. They don’t necessarily need it, but it’s not a luxury, either. The zone, and the clock-killing full-court pressure that comes with it, is part of their identity. Yet in Game 1 Miami used just nine possessions of zone, as logged by Synergy Sports, and Boston produced 1.55 points-per against it.

Some of what was just Porzingis being a tough player to zone, his ability to shoot in the middle of the floor drawing attention – and creating space for others – where Miami might otherwise be happy to leave a less efficient center to work.

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Celtics Game 1: Porzingis Zone Touch

At other times Boston opted to attack out of the wings and corners, Jayson Tatum posting up the low man of the zone and forcing two to the ball as Sam Hauser reaped the benefits on the weakside.

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Celtics Game 1: Tatum Zone Doubles

“Last year it was a lot easier because they didn’t have Porzingis and I think our zone made a lot of problems for them,” Nikola Jovic said. “It can make a lot of problems this year too but with Porzingis in the lineup, who can stretch the floor and shoot it over anyone, it’s just really hard to guard him. Sam Hauser shot all those threes off great ball movement they had.”

But what was most interesting about Boston’s zone approach, and this is a benefit to having so many reliable ballhandlers in the rotation, is that they treated Miami’s full-court press as part of that zone rather than an initial level to beat. Most teams focus on the press break to ensure they get the ball across the halfcourt line before eight seconds elapse, and then they go into their zone offense. The Celtics, meanwhile, were getting into their zone offense as they broke the press, putting players into optimal positions before the zone could congeal into its intended shape.

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Celtics Game 1: Boston Early Zone Offense

As with Boston’s three-point heavy approach they’re always susceptible to a cold spell, but as much as Miami’s zone allows threes it’s not intended to allow open, ball-movement-derived three. The HEAT want to induce against-the-clock stagnation, and if Boston’s strategy make the secondary scheme unviable that’s a significant blow to Miami’s arsenal. Keep an eye on how much zone the HEAT use in Game 2, as well as the minutes distribution between Love and Jovic – Miami went to some small-ball looks – at the backup center spot.

Miami was at a math disadvantage in the first half, getting outscored by 27 points at the three-point line not just because they had only made three but they had also attempted just 14 from the arc while Boston was 12-of-30. That’s not going to be a winning formula, especially when you aren’t compensating with rim attempts (seven in the first half) or free-throws (six for both the half and the game). With Boston also winning the turnover column (only three) and collecting a handful of offensive boards to give them seven more field-goal attempts, that’s trouble.

The second half was much more manageable, Miami taking 23 threes to Boston’s 19, attempting six more shots overall. Boston still attempted 12 more threes overall, Miami at 43 percent frequency from the arc and Boston at 53 percent, but the HEAT earning more and more catch-and-shoot looks as the game wore on is a good sign. Granted some of those came from Delon Wright with Boston giving him space to shoot – there’s no easy way to look this up, but Wright has to be one of the first 30+ year olds to match his previous career high in threes, five, in a single postseason quarter as he did in the fourth – but with Porzingis and Horford sometimes assigned to Wright, Caleb Martin or Jaime Jaquez Jr. in order to help off into the paint, Miami is going to need some threes from low-to-medium volume shooters.

“That was pretty crazy,” Wright said. “I don’t think I’ve ever hit that many in a row. I just have to take the open shots they give me.”

Still, you might not see Miami take 14 or fewer threes in a half very often going forward. Whether or not they’ll take more threes, or if they should even be trying to take more, than Boston is an entirely different question. The HEAT’s ability to scale up their three-point volume has been a topic since preseason, and though they were rarely healthy enough – Rozier would certainly help in this category – to get a real sense of what their true shot profile should look like, the fact is that Boston averaged 42 attempts per game and Miami only attempted 40 threes nine times all season.

There’s a real danger in trying to force shots you aren’t comfortable with. As much as Miami will want to keep their volume at a decent pace, pushing too hard in a direction that isn’t natural for the personnel on hand can also take you out of your game. Boston has so many shooters, and can tilt the defense by going matchup hunting consistently enough, that they are going to get their looks, with Miami’s defense having a say in how contested those looks are. Trying to beat a historically great offense at their own math game by trying to outdo their idealized shot profile sounds like trying to sprint through quicksand. The better path is to play your own game, and Miami’s second half, with a 116.7 Offensive Rating, was procedurally closer to it.

-Keep an eye on how much help Jaime Jaquez Jr. is drawing in Game 2. He scored 16 points on 8-of-16 shooting against mostly single coverage, with Boston failing to stop the ball on one coast-to-coast drive and losing him on another rim cut, but there were hints of help coming his way in the second half that we might see more of going forward. Granted some of that may be Holiday using the defensive freedom granted to him, but Jaquez Jr. had a usage rate of 25 percent and has often been used as a secondary creator since Butler’s knee injury. When you have the ball in your hands that much, defenses start thinking about adjustments.

-Both teams turned in below-average drives, only 34 for a Miami team that averaged 50.8 per 100 possessions, 30 for a Boston team that averaged 40 per 100. Not super surprising, given the quality and styles of defenses, and the fact that this was a very slow-paced game at just 88 possessions apiece.

-In addition to Jovic at center, we also saw some Adebayo-Love minutes in the fourth quarter when Miami was trying to cut into the lead. That pairing was +3 in 4.5 minutes.

-Boston did not run much this season, playing in transition only 14 percent of the time, but that frequency dropped to 5.7 percent in Game 1. Miami’s press and their own low turnover rate likely influenced that, but the cost – transition defense and offensive glass crash rate are always linked – may have been just five offensive boards to call their own.

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Coverage Consideration For Tyler Herro And Bam Adebayo, Boston's Heads Up Zone Approach And The Pythagorean Problem

The Denver Nuggets beat the Miami HEAT in both matchups this season, with Jamal Murray and Aaron Gordon missing the February matchup that both Kyle Lowry and Tyler Herro also missed. Miami has one win against Denver since the 2017-18 season. These teams have never met in the NBA Finals.

Game 1: You aren’t going to find many uglier offensive starts than the one Miami had tonight. Playing at altitude in Denver always messes with the ol’ biochemistry, but the HEAT started off 6-of-29 from the field and were fortunate to be down just four after the opening stanza thanks to eight offensive boards and six turnovers from the Nuggets – the formula that has so often juiced Miami’s field-goal attempt totals even as they struggle to find their shooting.

Strange part about that start, though, is the offense wasn’t necessarily a problem. The shooting was either going to come around or it wasn’t – and it sure did, as the HEAT came back to score 38 in the second and shoot 40 percent from three overall – but on the other side of the floor any Denver possession that didn’t end in a turnover, which was plenty because Miami is so good in that area, was ending in a pretty great opportunity. Granted, Bones Hyland kept Denver in front as the offense came around because of some deep, though open, threes, but those were the minutes the Nuggets were trying to survive without Nikola Jokic. So, even as the HEAT started scoring better, Denver put up 37 of their own in the second. But a three-point game at the break, after a solid closing run, means you get to toss the box-score and start over.

Starting the third on a 9-0 run always helps, too. As the turnovers continued to flow from Denver’s end, the defensive process picked up. More physicality. Better pickup. Better contests. Jokic remained a handful, the HEAT kept winning in the margins. When Jokic had to sit, Jimmy Butler absolutely punished the drop coverage of DeAndre Jordan, and by the time Jokic came back in the fourth Miami was playing with an eight-point lead.

Then Jokic came back and we had ourselves another clutch HEAT game in a hurry. Nobody could miss. Back and forth the lead went. Jokic one way. Tyler Herro the other. Then Jamal Murray on the way back. The HEAT’s fourth quarter offense was solid. Better than usual. It just wasn’t 39 points good, which was Denver total in the period. A 124-119 loss in the end despite Miami doing so many of the things it typically does in a win – and this was a game that would’ve felt like a bit more than just a win – but tough to overcome Jokic and Denver’s 60 percent shooting from three. Box Score

Game 2: Once again a familiar story for recent times, as the shorthanded HEAT (missing Tyler Herro and Victor Oladipo, among others) took an early lead – 36-27 after a quarter – over the shorthanded Nuggets (missing Jamal Murray and Aaron Gordon) thanks to early shooting, early cutting and early energy.This time, the shooting sustained for a bit. Three threes from Gabe Vincent. Three from Max Strus. A pair – the first and second of his career – from Jamaree Bouyea. The HEAT were helping themselves in the possession game, consistently with ten more shot attempts in that box-score column as they crashed the glass and kept the mistakes down, but it was the shooting that kept pace. Denver, however, was a freight train. Their Offensive Rating of 158.5 was the highest Miami had allowed in any half of basketball over the past two seasons – at least – and the points came from everywhere as they shot 8-of-14 from three and 17-of-24 on two pointers. In that context, early lead or not, Miami being within three headed into the break was about as good an outcome as could possibly be expected.

Denver stretched things out from there thanks to their star, going up by as much as 10, but Miami’s offense just kept chugging along. It could have looked worse than 89-83 going into the fourth, too, thanks to the HEAT getting something of an eight-point swing in their favor with Jokic on the bench – two missed Denver shots at the rim on one end, a putback of an airball and a Max Strus (23 points on 20 shots) runner through contact on the other. Strus kept saving the proverbial bacon from there, hitting a fading three early in the fourth, another tough, high-speed runner off the glass and a beautiful euro-step along the baseline to keep Miami within three.

Then Jokic (27 points, 12 rebounds, eight assists, no turnovers, 12-of-14 shooting) returned and the gap quickly widened back to seven, where it would stay for a bit until Strus closed it back to four with a free-throw at the 2:23 mark. Another clutch game, of course, and Miami had their chances to make it a one possession game – Denver finally closed hard on one of Strus’ drives late after running him off the line and stonewalled the shot – but the Nuggets were just too steady in the end with the ball in Jokic’s hands. Miami fell, 112-108, with Jimmy Butler adding 24 on 18 shots and Adebayo scoring 19 on 14 in their 32nd game this season decided by five points or fewer. Box Score

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The Season That Was Vs. Denver

Some series you can run through with a fine-tooth comb and keep coming up with new strategic discoveries. Some series don’t have through lines or threads, each game speaking its own language.

Other series are rather simple. The team that does this and that is the team that wins.

On the surface, these Eastern Conference Finals feel like the latter sort. For three games, Miami both shot better than Boston and had fewer turnovers. For the next two games, Boston made more threes and committed fewer errors. Each contest has coincided with the winning team winning both categories. You shoot well and take care of the ball, you win.

If you’re the HEAT, still a game away from the NBA Finals, that might be comforting. They’ve shot the ball extraordinarily, historically well at times in the postseason, owning three of the best shotmaking games in modern playoff history with two of those coming against Boston, and turnovers have generally not been a consistent issue for them. If all they have to do is two things they can do well, they’ve proven themselves more than capable.

If you’re Boston, there’s solace knowing that you’re probably one of the best volume shooting teams of all time. If the HEAT can knock off the Milwaukee Bucks by shooting 45 percent from deep over the course of five games, the Celtics can certainly hover around 40 percent over four. Like Miami last season, when they were 32-2 on nights they shot 40 percent or better from three, the Celtics are now 38-2 when hitting that mark. With enough talent, defense and discipline to your gameplan, good shooting is effectively a win condition all on its own.

It’s never that simple, even if it feels like it at times. There’s a process to generating good threes just as you don’t accidentally fall into the other team turning the ball over. The latter category is of particular interest because Boston, generally speaking, doesn’t force many turnovers. They had the fifth-lowest opponent turnover percentage in the league this season, with Milwaukee coming in last. Both teams had good reason for it, not requiring many risk-taking endeavors because the bones of their defenses were so strong. The Bucks had their coverage and stuck to it, relying on the lower expected percentages of the shots they allowed to carry the day, while Boston maintained faith in their individual defenders, using switches to flatten out opposing actions and trusting that they could force tough shots one-on-one.

Milwaukee never adjusted in any meaningful way, and they lost – albeit in a fashion that required Giannis Antetokounmpo to miss a few games and for Miami to stage consecutive dramatic fourth-quarter comebacks. The Celtics, meanwhile, have clearly decided that they aren’t going out on their heels.

In Game 1, you could argue that Boston over adjusted to the dominant postseason that Jimmy Butler was having. Yes, Butler was scoring one-on-one, but they were sending help – obvious, expected help – even when it wasn’t necessary. Butler or Bam Adebayo didn’t even have to be in a threatening position. They didn’t even have to have a live dribble. Help came, the right pass was made and HEAT role players capitalized on the shots they knew were coming. Boston’s help came to Miami’s aid more than it ever came close to discombobulating them.

They reversed course in Game 2, holding strong in the faith that they could get stops without compromising or bending the rest of their defense. It earned them another temporary double-digit lead, but Butler and Adebayo attacked the matchups they wanted as Boston’s gambit, putting Robert Williams on Caleb Martin where they thought he could help off into the paint, failed with Martin playing one of the best games of his career. Game 3 was such an avalanche, another incredible shooting night from the HEAT, that not much else mattered. The way Game 4 started, everything was still playing out on Miami’s terms.

Since the second half of Game 4, the rules of engagement have changed – moderately at least. This isn’t just Boston getting hot and Miami coughing the ball up, even if there has been some fumbleitis on their particular symptom list. The Celtics are forcing turnovers because they’re trying to force turnovers. What’s happening is real in part because Boston is playing a bit against type. They’ve adjusted and taken agency in their own fate. These past two games have come with, easily, Miami’s two highest turnover percentages of this entire run.

“Their activity level has gone up the last two games, and that's what you have to expect in a competitive playoff series,” Erik Spoelstra said. “And then we're playing in a crowd quite a bit.”

For good reason, too, because strangely enough these two teams have flipped offensive identities since last year – at least in relation to each other. In the previous seven-game series, Miami struggled mightily to score in the half-court, requiring stops and turnovers to feed their offense and get them playing with some pace. Through five games this year, Boston is scoring just 1.01 points per possession in the half-court off a made HEAT field goal or free throw. Off defensive rebounds or live-ball turnovers – 13 of Miami’s 16 turnovers in Game 5 were steals – they’re scoring 1.29 points per possession.&nbsp; The HEAT’s entire offense resides comfortably within that range, more consistent against a set defense but a bit less explosive after getting stops.

So what is Boston doing? They’re helping without overhelping. They’re shrinking the floor. They’re being opportunistic with their swipes and their pokes and their stunts. They’re playing, in many ways, like Miami – one of the best pass-pilfering and dribble-dispossessing groups you’ll find anywhere.

Take the first possession of Game 5, one that Boston players were crediting with setting an early tone for whatever that is worth to you. Until recently, the Celtics have almost always trusted Horford to defend Adebayo one-on-one, but with Adebayo producing nearly 1.3 points-per-isolation through the first three games of the series – and having scored efficiently against Boston all throughout the regular season – he seems to have earned at least a few shares of respect.

So, on this first possession, Marcus Smart helps. He doesn’t send an early, obvious double. He does what Miami does and waits until the ball is in, or headed towards, a dangerous position, and attacks the dribble.

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Celtics Game 5: First Possession Turnover

“Definitely more of a packed paint,” Adebayo said.

Later on, watch how Boston defense this Butler-Adebayo pick-and-roll – Miami’s most-used action, in its various forms, this entire postseason.

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Celtics Game 5: Third Quarter Crowd Steal

Smart and Horford concede the switch and a relatively simple entry pass, but Horford is biding his time, waiting for the dribble. As soon as Adebayo puts the ball on the floor, Horford digs in. Adebayo makes the right pass back to Butler for a catch-and-go, but as soon as Butler puts the ball on the floor going downhill, Horford is already recovering in front and Derrick White is poking the ball away, with Jayson Tatum looming as a second layer of the arms-and-hands gauntlet.

“They jammed us up several times in the paint with quick hands, strip-downs, things of that nature,” Spoelstra said. “We have to shore that up. That's two games in a row of that. We do have to be aggressive and then make the appropriate plays with appropriate spacing.”

Frame for frame, it’s almost exactly the sort of turnover that Miami has routinely siphoned out of Boston for the past two years, especially from Tatum and Jaylen Brown. Along those lines here’s a real doozy of a statistic – through five games, Boston already has more pick-six turnovers (14) than they did in last year’s seven-game series (13), with eight of them coming in the past two contests.

A couple of possessions later, we don’t even need video. Look at how Horford is spacing an Adebayo post-up on Brown, the same matchup Adebayo demolished with a spinning dunk in Game 3.

“They pack the paint really well, switching really well and just contesting shots without fouling,” Butler said. “But it's on us to get [Adebayo] in better positions to score the ball, get it to him in transition and stuff like that. When you look at the film and look at how we can be better and getting him into his spots with the ball, with the position and with the time on the clock to score, we'll be better at that.”

The Butler-Adebayo pick-and-roll has been the central tenant of Miami’s offense in this postseason – along with Adebayo’s connections with Lowry and Gabe Vincent – for how it gets Butler going downhill and how it creates advantageous matchups for both players. Boston obviously knows this and they’ve tweaked their coverages to eliminate as much as they can. They give up the switch – Boston switched more in Game 5 than in any game this series – but Butler’s defender stays attached to Adebayo and limits the chance of a hard roll while Adebayo’s initial defender stays flat and waits for Butler to approach – not as deep a drop as Brook Lopez was playing, but not respecting the three-point line, either. Even if Butler eventually gets the White matchup he’s seeking – White has his best game of the series staying in front and staying down on Butler’s fakes – it’s all side-to-side for Miami.

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Celtics Game 5: Jimmy-Bam PnR

With Vincent unavailable to pace the early offense and provide a dangerous off-dribble threat against a big playing a few feet off the arc, Butler and Adebayo used a season-high 17 pick-and-rolls in Game 5 – a game in which neither topped 35 minutes due to the late deficit – and the action only produced 0.50 points-per including assist opportunities. Through Game 3 of this series, that number was 1.06 in the postseason. On a related note, Butler’s 10 drives, as tracked by Second Spectrum, were a postseason low.

As you’ve probably noticed in these examples, Boston is primarily helping off Butler while staying within closeout-range – their closeouts were entirely on point, to their credit – on Miami’s other shooters, which is part of the reason why they took a postseason-low 23 attempts from three. Without Vincent’s pull-up threes and with Kyle Lowry struggling in Game 5, the HEAT needed to generate the sort of catch-and-shoot opportunities that have been difficult to come by in this series – part of why Boston’s Shot Quality numbers have been so superior. The Celtics are creating upwards of 30 catch-and-shoot three attempts per 100 possessions, consistent with their league-leading mark in the regular-season. For Miami? Just below 20, well below both the 25 they averaged in the first 82 and the 21 the Atlanta Hawks generated, last among all teams.

If Vincent is available for Game 6, that alleviates some of the possession-to-possession pressure on Miami’s two offensive engines to create everything themselves. Even if he can’t, the good news is that this isn’t anything the HEAT haven’t dealt with before. Milwaukee dared Butler to make jumpers and he crushed them over the top. New York crowded Adebayo in the paint and the HEAT found enough offense – even if that series was mostly about them jamming up the Knicks – to prevail, with Adebayo making the reads he spent all season making when teams brought third and fourth defenders into his airspace.

They can also just be better in everything that they do. At their best, the HEAT never stop moving. Someone is always a step ahead of their defender. Someone is always disappearing from where their defender thinks they should be. Someone is always finding space while everyone else is in exactly the right spot.

“Those guys, they play at an incredible pace,” Tatum said. “They kind of remind me -- kind of the pace they play at is kind of similar to the Warriors. They sprint to their spots. They sprint off screens. They find those pockets. They relocate. You can't blink because they'll relocate, you'll lose a shooter for a three, so you've got to be disciplined, you've got to be sound, you've got to chase those guys because all night they're going to be running. You've got to bring your track shoes.”

In the last six quarters, they haven’t looked like what Tatum is describing. Boston’s switching will do that to anyone, but previously the HEAT were taking their bad possessions – the ones where the ball never gets closer than 15 feet and they’re stuck without a dribble and the shot clock is shrinking – in stride and getting right back to their game. That hasn’t been the case, but it can easily be so again. It’s much more difficult for Boston to be as precise with their help and rotations if you’re making them process the court a half-second faster.

There’s still a yellow flag flying over this series, which is that the Celtics have managed to score 1.18 points-per-possession in the half-court against Miami’s man-to-man coverage. The defense has been buoyed, to this point, by the zone defense limiting the Celtics to 1.05 points per. The zone continued to do its job in Game 5, even without Vincent’s tactile skillset paired with Martin in the top two spots, as it changed the rhythm of the game and slowed the Celtics down, but factoring in Boston’s offensive rebounding that coverage allowed 1.43 points-per across 21 possessions. You can feel the Celtics growing more comfortable the more zone they see, screening the wings, getting into the paint and finding the open threes they want. Even if the zone turns it into more of a make-or-miss game on Boston’s part, too many makes can spell doom when every basket matters.

In Miami’s favor is the fact that outside of their main actions, their younger role players continue to excel. Martin was well on his way to another Caleb Martin Game back in Miami before things went haywire, and he was again decisive with the ball in his hands in Game 5. Boston still doesn’t quite seem to know what to do with Duncan Robinson – his nine assists on Thursday were, unsurprisingly, a career high – as they run him off the line and he makes them pay off the dribble. Haywood Highsmith was a few possessions short of a revelation, managing the top of the zone and closing out on a dime as he continues to give Tatum trouble one-on-one. Another confident game from Highsmith, attacking when Boston helped off of him and otherwise draining three triples on four attempts, could easily turn a result.

And yet we have must return to the simple items. Miami needs to shoot well, or at least shoot better than Boston, and based on how this series is playing out they’re going to have to so on some fairly tough shots – on average, they’re taking more than a full dribble more than Boston before a shot attempt. They’ll need to get back to taking care of the ball, working the crowd that Boston is sending into the paint, while disrupting what Boston wants to get to. They’ll need to look more like the HEAT than the Celtics look like the HEAT.

This series is still going at 3-2 because for the last six quarters, the Celtics have manifested a version of themselves that looks quite a bit like what Miami is always trying to be. For the HEAT to punch their ticket to the NBA Finals, they can’t let anyone play to their own identity better than they do.

Forget about history. Forget about records and what has or hasn’t happened before. All that matters is what is right in front of you. And that’s Game 6 – nothing more than another late-May opportunity to be exactly who they mean to be, rough edges and all that comes with it.

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Working The Crowd: The Celtics Extended The Series By Becoming The Team They’re Trying To Beat, But The HEAT Have Seen It All Before

The Boston Celtics needed somewhere to put Robert Williams.

Not in the sense that they had to hide Williams. Quite the opposite. They needed, they’ve always needed, somewhere to put Williams in order to maximize his defensive skillset. The only way to properly leverage one of the best help defenders in the league is to put him somewhere where he can help. Typically that means finding the weakest shooter on the other team.

On this particular night, Caleb Martin draws the short straw.

On this particular play, Bam Adebayo is posting up on the right side of the free-throw line. He takes a glance at the paint and sees Williams, one foot in one foot out, 20 feet away from Martin and ready to help on any attack. Adebayo sees this and immediately fires a pass to Martin, who wastes not in a second in putting the ball on the floor as Williams begins his long closeout. Barely a second later, he’s a step ahead of Williams as he’s jamming the ball through the rim.

That was 16 months ago. Miami got crushed that night, 122-92, with Jimmy Butler unavailable. But Martin, scoring 14 points – including a three, an isolation pull-up jumper and a transition score all over the top of or through Williams – offered a memory worth saving on an otherwise forgettable evening.

Make or miss, he was mad as hell – alright, maybe measured as limbo better fits his personality – and he wasn’t going to take it anymore.

A couple weeks later, Celtics color commentator Brian Scalabrine made a note of this to ESPN’s Zach Lowe in an appearance on The Lowe Post when discussing the otherwise historic run Boston’s defense was on.

“That was the only time I’ve ever seen this defense where I’m like, ‘Oh, that could be a problem,’” Scalabrine said.

Martin filed that game away. A few months later in the Eastern Conference Finals, Boston put Williams on him again. With Martin banged up, struggling with his shot and in and out of the rotation at that point as a result, the strategy played out for the Celtics. Williams defended Martin for 11 touches in that series, more than any other player defended Martin all postseason, and the HEAT produced just 0.45 points-per-possession with that matchup on the board.

Notably, Martin was never passive. He still saw the matchup as an opportunity to drive the closeouts or shoot over the top. He didn’t win many of those possessions, but he never gave in and allowed Williams to roam free of consequence.

Fast forward to this season. In the Bahamas for training camp, Martin – having enjoyed one of the first offseasons of his career when he did not have to make major changes to his shooting mechanics – still has the coverages from the previous season, which included the Milwaukee Bucks trying the same tactic and giving up a career-high to Martin in the process, on his mind.

“I might take two or three attempts a game and guys would shrink off and allow me to shoot it even if I make them, thinking ‘Alright, we’ll live with two or three.’ But if I’m shooting five, six, seven, and I start making those, that’s a lot different.”

With Williams missing the start of the season and Boston generally using the two-big lineup with Al Horford less – the pair was never available in any of the four matchups – Martin only sees Williams for one lonely possession as his primary defender. What happens on that possession? Williams sags into the paint to help out on Adebayo and Martin drains a catch-and-shoot three. Williams doesn’t even try to contest.

“They did it last year, so it's almost like he's had 12 months to prepare for this,” Erik Spoelstra said Friday night. “You know, he has a lot of pride. He doesn't like being dis – whatever, you know.”

Spoelstra stops himself short of completing the word on the tip of his tongue, but the meaning is clear.

Jump ahead another few months. The HEAT are at home, having dispatched the New York Knicks in six games, waiting for the results of Game 7 between Boston and Philadelphia. Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla notably makes a change to the starting lineup before Game 6, with his team down 3-2 in the series, and goes back to the two-big starting lineup. Martin watches, already thinking about what’s ahead of him – preparing for what’s ahead of him.

“I just knew from the jump, I automatically triggered my brain to last year and the playoffs and knew exactly how they were going to guard me,” Martin said. “So I've been preparing myself the minute we beat the Knicks and we were preparing for Boston. I just automatically started trying to re-circuit my brain to the looks I would get and how guys are going to help off of me and preparing to be ready and confident and assertive.”

Now it’s Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals. Everything Martin had imagined is playing out. In Game 1 Mazzulla had mostly kept Williams assigned to centers, but as he re-inserts Grant Williams into the rotation – someone they trust to both switch and defend centers – it frees up Rob Williams for other assignments.

A couple possessions pass without much of note happening. Martin catches on the wing and feeds Adebayo in the post, but as he cuts through the paint Williams stops short, lingering around the rim as Adebayo makes his move.

Spoelstra and Kyle Lowry take note of this. We know they do because a little over a minute later, Martin gets involved in the play, setting a screen for Lowry. It’s tough for a player to help off their mark and roam if they have to defend the primary action.

Martin wastes no time. Williams, for his part, closes to his man but Martin is already on the move as soon as he touches the ball.

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Celtics Game 2: Caleb Attacks Rob Matchup

The actual finish is incredibly difficult. It might not even be a shot that Martin is going to convert at a high percentage, but since when has Shot Quality mattered to the HEAT during this postseason? Note the score, too, with Miami down 11 after having just surrendered a 21-2 run. Tough finish or not, Martin faces down his foe and cauterizes the wound.

“Everybody has a game plan or a scheme to follow. I get it,” Martin says. “When you're dealing with guys as good as Jimmy, Bam, guys that draw so much attention, you kind of have to pick your poison. I'm on the short end of the stick when it comes to that.

Neither Martin, nor Spoelstra, let’s Williams off the hook after that. His coach putting him in position to succeed, running Williams through screens to keep him on the move, Martin is willing as ever to do the job.

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Celtics Game 2: Martin Scoring Rob Matchup

Williams finished the game defending Martin for six touches, giving up 10 points – that’s 1.66 points per possession. For now, the jury is out on whether or not Boston tries the matchup again.

“One thing Caleb told me was, ‘This is not last year,’” Adebayo said. “That really resonated with me, because they did the same thing to him last year. I feel like he felt like it was disrespectful.”

All told, the tug-o-war with Williams was only part of Martin’s incredible evening, during which he scored a postseason career high 25 points on 16 shots, including 3-of-7 from three. He didn’t need a specific matchup to be successful. That’s been true all through this run when, like his teammates, he’s sought out ways to make a mark regardless of whether or not that means scoring. Game 2 just happened to be about points, Martin again stopping a run with a five-point burst in the third quarter as Miami was falling behind, then eating into yet another Boston double-digit lead at the start of the fourth quarter with two more scores, one of them a finish over a helping Williams at the rim.

In Game 3, it might be something else. With Martin, currently 9-of-15 in the paint and 4-of-8 on above-break threes against Boston, there’s always something else.

“He's not your traditional 3-and-D guy,” Spoelstra says. “He's a little unconventional, out of the box, so he can do a lot of different things.”

Two years ago Martin, waived by the Charlotte Hornets, took a chance on himself by accepting a two-way contract from a franchise known for developing players. Slowly but surely, he earned his way into the rotation and was rewarded with a new contract in free agency last summer. At that point, his future as an NBA player was secured but he wasn’t a known commodity, as a role player, in the same manner as previous HEAT rotation stars-in-their-roles. The 2022-23 season, whether he was starting at power forward or coming off the bench, was his chance to make a name for himself as one of the league’s premier glue guys – and not be mistaken for his twin, Cody.

Safe to say that now everyone is going to know his name.

There have been plenty of opportunities to discuss the exploits of Butler and Adebayo during this run and there will be plenty more. We don’t need to dwell on this too long, but we do need to take a minute for one of Boston’s main adjustments in Game 2.

Essentially, they stopped doubling and left their defenders out on islands with Miami’s best scorers.

In Game 1 pretty much all of Miami’s role players knew where their shots were going to come from with Boston sending extra – sometimes entirely unnecessary – defenders the way of the HEAT’s two primary engines.

“They were kind of expected,” Martin said of the shots the team got in Game 1. “The way we got them today, they’re coming to double, they’re overhelping from corners.”

The quickest way to raise the collective power level of a team’s role players to 9000 is to give them open, consistent, repeatable looks. Sure enough, the HEAT made over half their threes as they stiff-armed Boston to the finish line. The expectation for Game 2 was that Boston would trust their individual defenders and stay home more often on shooters.

For Butler the result was 22 isolations, a gargantuan number that stands as the second-most in a game this postseason – behind James Harden – and a career-high for Butler in any game, playoffs or otherwise. That number makes sense. If you switch a ton and don’t help, you’re going to induce isolations. The strategy was working out for Boston through three period, with Butler producing just 0.66 points per direct isolation as he tried to carry the offensive burden.

Things flipped in closing time. Your mileage may vary on extra-curricular activities with Grant Williams, but fact is Butler scored nine points on eight isolations in the fourth quarter – 11 points off six Williams isolations across the entire game – as Miami made up another double-digit deficit to take the lead.

“I felt like in the fourth, it's all about getting a bucket,” Butler said when asked about Boston switching into single coverage. “Whether you're taking a contested shot, a wide-open shot, it's all about getting shots on goal.

“I can only tell y'all so many times how much confidence that my teammates put in me, the coaching staff puts in me to just go out there and hoop, play care-free and, as we like to say in our locker room, take us there.”

NBA Playoffs

The Corner Key: Quantity Leads To Quality, And Space For Tyler Herro, As The HEAT Head Toward Game 2

Coup’s Takeaways: Ty Jerome Runs Away With Fourth Quarter As HEAT Drop Game 1

Coverage Consideration For Tyler Herro And Bam Adebayo, Boston's Heads Up Zone Approach And The Pythagorean Problem

The Season That Was Vs. Denver

Working The Crowd: The Celtics Extended The Series By Becoming The Team They’re Trying To Beat, But The HEAT Have Seen It All Before

All Due Respect: Caleb Martin Makes Boston Pay While Jimmy Butler And Bam Adebayo Shoulder The Weight Of Island Life

Sustainable Energy: Jimmy Butler And The HEAT Keep Shooting Historically As They Take Game 1 In Boston

HEAT vs. Celtics, The Threequel: Starters, Turnovers, Coverages And Everything Else To Watch For As The Eastern Conference Finals Opens