Heat to open Las Vegas Summer League vs. ... Kasparas Jakucionis? ‘I hope he plays’
.JPG "Miami Heat guard Kasparas Jakucionis (25) reacts after scoring against the Orlando Magic in the first half of their NBA game at Kaseya Center on March 14, 2026, in Miami.")
Just a few weeks ago, guard Kasparas Jakucionis was an offseason regular in the Miami Heat’s practice facility at Kaseya Center. But now, the Heat’s summer league team is preparing for a potential matchup against Jakucionis.
Life happens fast in the NBA.
Jakucionis, 20, is among the four players and draft capital that the Heat sent to the Milwaukee Bucks to acquire two-time NBA MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo and veteran forward Bobby Portis.
It also just so happens that the Heat opens Las Vegas Summer League against the Bucks on Friday (4 p.m., WPLG Local 10 and Prime Video) at Thomas & Mack Center on UNLV’s campus, and Jakucionis was added to the Bucks’ summer league roster for Las Vegas after spending time with the Lithuanian national team last week.
“It’s going to be competitive,” Heat assistant coach and summer league head coach Wayne Ellington said with a smile on Wednesday regarding a potential matchup against Jakucionis. “Yeah, we still love him. He was great for us in terms of being as coachable as he is and willing to work. But this is the NBA. So we’ll see him on the other side, and we’re going to compete.”
It remains to be seen whether Jakucionis will play against the Heat in Friday’s summer league contest since he just returned from playing overseas for his national team and is still finding his footing following the trade to the Bucks. But those on the Heat’s summer league roster who were Jakucionis’ Heat teammates last season hope he’s on the court Friday.
“That first game is going to be fun,” said Heat summer league guard Trevor Keels, who closed last season on a two-way contract with Miami. “I know the fans and everybody is excited for that game. I hope he plays. We haven’t seen him because he was playing with the Lithuanian team. I’m just happy to see him. Hopefully he plays. It’s good to play against him. He’s a hell of a player. So it’ll be good for us.”
Heat summer league center Vlad Goldin, who also ended last season on a two-way contract with Miami, quipped that “we definitely have a good scouting report on [Jakucionis].”
Jakucionis, who the Heat selected with the 20th overall pick in last year’s NBA Draft, played in 53 games and made 12 starts during his first NBA regular season. The only player in franchise history who played in more regular-season games with the Heat as a teenager is Justise Winslow, who played in 69 games as a 19-year-old in his rookie season in 2015-16.
Jakucionis closed the regular season with appearances in 52 of the Heat’s final 56 regular-season games. He logged double-digit minutes in 45 of those 52 appearances.
Jakucionis ended his first NBA regular season averaging 6.2 points, 2.6 rebounds and 2.6 assists per game while shooting 42.9% from the field and 42.3% from three-point range. The Heat outscored teams by three points per 100 possessions when he was on the court last regular season.
“I love Kas. He reached out to all of us,” Keels continued. “We’ve been talking to him. I used to love going against him in practices, workouts. He’s the ultimate competitor. He stays in the gym. I learned a lot from him, and he’s younger than me. His work ethic is unbelievable. Sometimes we have to tell him to get out of the gym just because he loves the gym.”
After beginning his rookie season out of the Heat’s rotation, Jakucionis went on to crack the Heat’s rotation in December by impressing coaches with his energy, playmaking skills and ability to hold up on defense. He also turned into one of the Heat’s top outside shooters.
While at lower volume than some of the Heat’s other top shooters, Jakucionis closed his first NBA regular season with a team-best three-point shooting percentage of 42.3% (66 of 156). Among the 242 NBA players who attempted more than 150 threes last regular season, Jakucionis finished with the 10th-best three-point percentage.
All of this is what made the Heat so reluctant to include Jakucionis in its trade offer to the Bucks before ultimately deciding to add him to the trade package later in the process to help complete the deal.
All of this is what also made Jakucionis so attractive to the Bucks as they begin rebuilding their roster. Along with Jakucionis and a haul of draft capital, the Bucks acquired guard Tyler Herro, forward Jaime Jaquez Jr. and center Kel’el Ware from the Heat in the trade.
“There was not a deal that we would have done that didn’t have each of these four players in it, including Kasparas,” Bucks general manager Jon Horst said to reporters on Wednesday. “Miami valued them all as well, as they should.
“Specific to [Jakucionis] and our excitement for him. Listen, he’s a big guard. He’s a recent first-round pick from a Miami organization that I think does a great job in the draft. He is incredibly competitive, incredibly hardworking, well-regarded by his college coaches, well-regarded by the [Lithuanian] national team, well-regarded from Miami folks. So, we’re excited about him. We’re excited about his positional size, we’re excited about his mentality, the pureness by which he plays the game. He plays the right way. He’s a table-setter. He’s a true point guard. He’s a very good shooter at a young age. He’s found a way to have a rotational impact on a Miami team last year, which means a lot for a coach in [Erik] Spoelstra, who we have a lot of respect for. So we’re excited about him and excited to see him and get to know him more and see how he grows with us.”
Jakucionis is looking forward to his new beginning with the Bucks, too. But the news of the trade hit him hard as a young player preparing for his second NBA season.
“The first day [after the trade] was tough because it was the first time in my basketball career that something like this happened to me, being traded without it being my decision,” Jakucionis said recently to BasketNews. “But I don’t think it’s a bad thing. It’s a young organization with a lot of young players, so I think it will be a good situation for me.”
Jakucionis added he “definitely parted ways on friendly terms” with the Heat.
“The [Heat] coaches called, everyone said what they wanted to say, and we definitely parted ways on friendly terms, so to speak,” Jakucionis said to BasketNews. “I think this is a business, and everyone understands that.”
It’s a business, and the Heat needed to do what it needed to do to land a future Basketball Hall of Famer.
“I’ve said to Miami a couple of times, he’s going to have an unbelievable season for them,” Horst said of Antetokounmpo. “[They’ve] got an incredibly motivated, healthy, focused Giannis Antetokounmpo that I think is going to have an unbelievable season and seasons, for that matter.”
