Observations and different notes of curiosity from Sunday evening’s 112-100 victory over the Detroit Pistons:
– One factor a couple of playoff race is it exhibits you who a coach trusts.
– We’ve already seen Duncan Robinson disappear from the rotation.
– Now, with Kyle Lowry again on Sunday evening, Victor Oladipo was shuffled out of the combo.
– Just as he was on Wednesday evening, when he didn’t play.
– And one more evening when Omer Yurtseven’s preliminary cameo was his solely alternative of substance.
– With Haywood Highsmith getting the second-half name, as an alternative.
– Albeit briefly.
– And one has to marvel what Erik Spoelstra really thinks about Tyler Herro’s shot choice.
– So Spoelstra rides with hope in Kevin Love (till he begins to bleed out).
– While hoping for a fast return from Cody Zeller.
– All because the play-in clock ticks.
– It’s as if a whole common season has come all the way down to when Jimmy Butler returns within the fourth quarter.
– Even with Lowry again, Gabe Vincent once more began for Heat, together with Bam Adebayo, Love, Butler and Herro.
– The Heat’s lone inactives have been Zeller and Orlando Robinson.
– The Pistons opened with Killian Hayes, Jaden Ivey, Rodney McGruder, Marvin Bagley III and James Wiseman.
– Among Detroit’s inactives have been Cade Cuningham, Bojan Bogdanovic, Alec Burks, Hamidou Diallo, R.J. Hampton, Isaiah Stewart and Isaiah Livers.
– Yurtseven performed because the Heat’s first reserve.
– Caleb Martin because the second.
– Lowry then entered with 2:04 left within the first interval, his first motion since Wednesday.
– But when Adebayo went out for his second relaxation, it was Love inserted as middle, relatively than Yurtseven returning.
– Later, it was Highsmith in for Adebayo.
– Remember that discuss of Heat depth?
– And that is with the Heat largely wholesome.
– Butler scored in double figures for the 211th time with the Heat, tying him with Mario Chalmers for fifteenth on that franchise all-time listing. Kevin Edwards is up subsequent, at 14th on the listing, at 226 such video games.
– Butler’s third free-throw try moved him previous Ray Allen for 89th on the NBA all-time listing.
– Butler’s ninth free-throw try moved him previous Elton Brand and Ed Macauley for 87th on the NBA all-time listing.
– Adebayo’s fifth free throw was the 1,four-hundredth of his profession.
– Strus’ second 3-point try was the 1,a centesimal of his profession.
– Vincent’s second 3-pointer tied him with Shane Battier for twenty first on the Heat all-time listing.
– Spoelstra pushed previous a pregame query about his video overview of Saturday evening’s loss in Chicago.
– “We’re much better than that,” he mentioned. “We’ll be better tonight.”
– Or not.
– He additionally downplayed the Pistons typically going with greater entrance strains.
– “We’re fine,” he mentioned. “Whatever it takes.”
– Pistons coach Dwane Casey was effusive pregame about what former Heat guard McGruder has supplied with Detroit sitting many veterans amid the unstated prioritizing of the lottery.
– McGruder then went out and outhustled everybody.
– Just like in his Heat days.
– The legend of The Scavenger lives on.
– Casey additionally spoke of how Adebayo is a job mannequin for Pistons first-round choose Jalen Duren.
– “Bam’s at the same stage where Duren was, maybe a little ahead of him but not much,” Casey mentioned of how the 2 entered the NBA. “He was not the offensive player he is right now. He’s worked at it. He’s developed an offensive game. He wasn’t bringing the ball down the floor in transition when he first came into the league. But he kept working and working.”
– Casey added, “The one thing Bam does, Bam runs. He probably learned it at Kentucky. But he runs. He runs both ends. Defensively he gets back and runs that way, and he runs the other way.”
–The scoreboard within the first quarter credited the factors to the incorrect crew, with a chant breaking out of, “Fix . . . the . . . scoreboard!”
– It was, by the beginning of the second interval.
– Former Heat guard Voshon Lenard was amongst these in attendance.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com