How has the Heat fared against the Pacers’ isolation attack? A breakdown
The Indiana Pacers’ offensive game plan is clear: Give the ball to the player who is being guarded by Tyler Herro or Duncan Robinson and clear out that area of the court.
While the Miami Heat has done a lot of things well and enters Game 4 on Monday looking for the first-round playoff sweep of the Pacers, Miami hasn’t had a lot of success defending these isolation situations when Indiana is able to get the matchup it wants.
“It’s no secret who they’re going at,” Herro said following a workout Sunday afternoon. “They’re going at me and Duncan. There’s no secret about it. I think everybody sees it. But that’s just something that I’m not going to run from it. They can continue to go at me. I’m going to continue to do my job and try my best, and my teammates and coaches have trust in me.”
In the first three games of its first-round series against the Pacers, the Heat defended about 17 isolations per game while allowing 1.27 points per possession in those situations, according to NBA Advanced Stats. In the regular season, those numbers would rank first and 30th in the league, respectively.
In other words, the Heat’s defense has seen a very high amount of isolation attacks and has struggled to contain them to begin the postseason. Most of those struggles have come when Herro and Robinson are the ones on Indiana’s isolation island, and Malcolm Brogdon has done most of the damage with 36 points on 25 isolation possessions in the series.
When Herro or Robinson is the primary defender, Indiana has scored 1.86 points per possession on isolation situations. The Pacers have scored just 0.87 points per possession when another Heat player is the defender.
Herro and Robinson combined to defend 21 isolation possessions in the first three playoff games, and Indiana scored 39 points on efficient 12-of-14 shooting on those possessions. Those numbers are why the Pacers continue to single out Herro and Robinson on the defensive end.
“They both really work at it and study it and really that’s why they improve,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “This is a tough league and it gets even more challenging in the playoffs. I love their approach every single day to try to get better, to take ownership of it. That’s why they both have gotten considerably better.”
Finding ways to help Herro and Robinson on the defensive end will continue to be a priority for the Heat throughout the playoffs, but the good news for Miami is that its other rotation players have fared well against Indiana’s isolation attack.
Heat All-Star center Bam Adebayo has been very good in these situations, as expected. The Pacers have scored just 0.75 points per possession on the 12 isolations Adebayo has defended in the series.
Herro and Robinson are working hard to catch up to their teammates on the defensive end, but they have been invaluable offensively.
“Let’s not forget the other side of the floor, as well,’ Spoelstra said when talking about Herro and Robinson. “They present a lot of challenges for the opposing team.”
That’s the reason Herro and Robinson have played big and important minutes despite their defensive struggles to begin the playoffs. Herro and Robinson are also part of the reason that Indiana’s isolation success hasn’t mattered, with the Heat shooting an incredible 42.7 percent from three-point range in the series.
Herro has averaged 16.7 points in 32.4 minutes, and Robinson has averaged 15 points with the help of 55 percent shooting on threes in 25.5 minutes to begin the postseason. The results have also still been positive with both players on the court, as Herro is a plus-13 and Robinson is a plus-19 in their first three playoff games.
“We’re going to continue to work at it,” Herro said of his one-on-one defense. “Like I said, we’re not running from anything. We’ll be here all series.”
HEAT’S BIG DAY FROM THE FOUL LINE
One of the big reasons the Heat was able to hold on for the 124-115 Game 3 win Saturday was because of its ability to get to the free-throw line.
Miami shot 43 of 52 on free throws. The Heat outscored the Pacers 43-21 at the foul line, as Indiana finished with 28 free-throw attempts.
The Heat shot 24 of 28 from the foul line over the final two quarters. That means nearly half of Miami’s 50 second-half points came at the charity stripe.
The 52 free throws the Heat attempted Saturday are the most a team has taken in a playoff game since the Los Angeles Clippers shot 63 free throws in Game 4 of a second-round series against the Houston Rockets in 2015. It’s also the second-most free throws Miami has finished a playoff game with and tied for the fourth-most it has finished any game with in franchise history.
Heat All-Star Jimmy Butler was the catalyst, as he shot 17 of 20 from the foul line Saturday. That went down as the fourth-most free throws a Heat player has attempted in a playoff game, with only LeBron James and Dwyane Wade attempting more in a postseason game.
“I can’t explain that,” Pacers coach Nate McMillan said Saturday. “Fifty-two free throws is ridiculous. They had 24 at the half — 24 attempts. Butler shoots 20 of them. This is the playoffs and I just thought some of those calls were just — I can’t explain it.”
Indiana wing Justin Holiday said Sunday of the Game 3 free-throw discrepancy: “They’re being more aggressive. They’re aggressors from the jump. They set the tone from the rip, period. When you do that, usually the refs go with that and give you the calls. Again, we know Jimmy, a move for him is getting to the line. That’s what he does. He does a good job of that and we have to focus in on trying not to foul him. Obviously, I believe some fouls weren’t fouls. But if the refs make the calls, they make the calls.”
THIS AND THAT
▪ Despite a 3-0 series lead, Spoelstra emphasized how difficult it will be to close things out with a 4-0 sweep on Monday.
“We call it competitive humility,” Spoelstra said. “You have to really have a humility and understand how difficult it is to win a single game in the playoffs. Whether you’re starting a series 0-0 or you’re up 3-0, it is incredible challenging. Each one of these games have had moments of truth where it has turned in our favor, and it just as easily could have gone the other way. We’ll get their best game tomorrow and hopefully we’ll get our best game, as well.”
▪ On the day Kobe Bryant would have turned 42, Spoelstra was asked how he believes Bryant would have fared in the NBA bubble.
“You have these time slots that the NBA dictates obviously because of the protocols and everything of when you can work out and for how long,” Spoelstra said Sunday. “I imagine Kobe Bryant would have figured out a way in this bubble to have his own gym time at 5 a.m. in the morning and have his own weight room time at 6 a.m. and have his own conditioning room at 7 a.m., and then meet the team for his normal practice times. Then somehow have a practice gym available to him at 11 o’clock at night or 12 o’clock at night when everybody else was sleeping.”
This story was originally published August 23, 2020 at 5:07 PM.
