How did Heat’s Tyler Herro do in 3-Point Contest? Also, Bam Adebayo on All-Star significance
All-Star Saturday Night included a Miami Heat representative, but it did not include a Heat winner.
The Heat was represented in one of the three All-Star Saturday Night events, with guard Tyler Herro taking part in the Three-Point Contest at Vivint Arena in Salt Lake City. Herro’s night ended quickly in the two-round, timed shooting competition featuring an eight-player field.
Herro finished with the sixth-best Round 1 score at 18, which was not enough to move on to the second and final round. The players with the three highest Round 1 scores — Indiana’s Tyrese Haliburton (31 points), Portland’s Damian Lillard (26 points) and Indiana’s Buddy Hield (23 points) — qualified for the championship round.
In the end, Lillard took home the crown with a score of 26 in the final.
With Heat teammates Bam Adebayo and Udonis Haslem sitting courtside, Herro began the competition slow by missing each of his first seven shots between the first and second racks. Herro started to get hot, making all five balls on the third rack on the way to hitting 10 consecutive threes, including the deep “Starry Range” ball worth three points set up between third and fourth racks to put himself in a position to rally from his unfortunate start.
But Herro ran out of time, as the 70-second round came to an end before he could finish the fifth and final rack. He was only able to put up 26 of the 27 possible shots during the round, rushing to get up as many as he could on the final rack.
Herro became the ninth different Heat player to participate in the shooting event but could not become the fifth different Heat player to win it. The four-man list of past Heat Three-Point Contest champions includes Glen Rice in 1995, Jason Kapono in 2007, Daequan Cook in 2009 and James Jones in 2011.
Only two other franchises have taken home four trophies from the Three-Point Contest: The Boston Celtics and Chicago Bulls. Herro could have put the Heat over the top with a first-place finish on Saturday.
This marked Herro’s first appearance on the All-Star Weekend stage. He was selected to take part in the Rising Stars Game as a rookie in 2020, but a foot injury kept him out of the game.
Herro, 23, is averaging 20.6 points, 5.7 rebounds and 4.4 assists per game in his fourth NBA season and his first as a full-time starter. He’s shooting a team-best 36.9 percent from three-point range on a team-high 8.1 three-point attempts per game this season.
As for the other two events on All-Star Saturday Night, the Utah Jazz three-man team of Jordan Clarkson, Walker Kessler and Collin Sexton won the Skills Challenge and Philadelphia 76ers guard Mac McClung won the Slam Dunk Contest.
BAM’S ALL-STAR EXPERIENCE
With Adebayo set to appear in his second NBA All-Star Game on Sunday (8:30 p.m., TNT), he spoke about the significance of again being part of All-Star Weekend.
“One thing, two-time [All-Star],” Adebayo said to the Miami Herald. “Then second, it’s one of those things where you get to sit in the locker room and you’re surrounded by who has been announced as the top 24 players in the league. For me, that’s great not only for me but also for the organization. We got All-Stars in here again. Also, just for my family. My family back home who people don’t believe that we’re related or anything in between. But I’ve never had a family member in the NBA. So just having that type of person in your family where everybody can gravitate to and you look at as an upstanding person, outstanding guy and the respect factor just speaks for itself when it comes to All-Star.”
Adebayo, 25, is the Heat’s lone All-Star this season and is one of two players representing Miami on the All-Star Weekend stage this year along with Herro. Haslem is also in Salt Lake City taking in the festivities with his family as part of his 20th and final NBA season.
Adebayo was voted into this year’s All-Star Game as an Eastern Conference reserve, but the team he’ll represent in the showcase event is still to be determined.
The two rosters for the All-Star Game will be drafted by Milwaukee Bucks forward Giannis Antetokounmpo and Los Angeles Lakers forward LeBron James as the All-Star starter who received the most fan votes in his respective conference. They will choose from the pool of players voted in as starters and reserves regardless of conference affiliation, and the All-Star draft will take place right before the All-Star Game for the first time ever just about an hour before tipoff at 7:30 p.m. on TNT.
“It’s going to be fun,” Adebayo continued. “My family gets to go out there to cold Utah, get a different side of scenery. It’s good when your family members who have never been in that type of environment get the chance to. Seeing my mom get to go out in that type of environment where she can joke with Stephen Curry, she can laugh with LeBron, talk to Giannis. It’s those things where you want your family members to have that type of interaction. I’m looking forward to it. I’m bringing my family with me, so it’s going to be fun.”
