After a big night, a look at how correlation has changed between Bam’s offense and winning
.JPG "Miami Heat’s Bam Adebayo (13) celebrates after scoring against the Boston Celtics during the second half of Game 3 of the NBA basketball playoffs Eastern Conference finals Saturday, May 21, 2022, in Boston.")
For the early stages of Bam Adebayo’s career, there wasn’t much correlation between his offensive aggressiveness and Heat winning.
That seemingly has changed over the past 14 months.
If Adebayo scores above his scoring average, the Heat wins a lot - more than it wins when he doesn’t.
Every bit of his 31 points – on a career-high 22 shots - were needed in Saturday’s extraordinary performance, which also included 10 rebounds, six assists, four steals and a block in a 109-103 win at Boston.
That victory that left Miami with a 2-1 lead in the Eastern Conference Finals heading into Game 4 on Monday night at TD Garden (8:30 p.m., ABC).
Adebayo, per ESPN, became only the fourth starting center to lead his team in points, rebounds, assists, steals and blocks in a win, joining Hakeem Olajuwon (who did it three times), Dikembe Mutombo (1994) and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (1977).
So how did Adebayo go from scoring a combined 16 points in two games on 10 total shots to 31 points and 22 shots in Game 3?
“We made some adjustments and we did some things to figure out how to get him going,” point guard Kyle Lowry said.
Adebayo said not much changed strategically: “Same old play calls. Just different mentality. They beat us like we stole something in Game 2. So that woke a fire up in all of us.”
The question of Adebayo’s offensive aggressiveness is a bit of a sensitive topic around the team, which Erik Spoelstra sometimes dismissing such dialogue by saying that’s not a way to gauge his effectiveness.
And in many ways, that’s true, because of everything Adebayo adds as an elite defender, skilled ball-handler and rebounder.
But when Adebayo attacks, with an eye on the rim, that has translated to winning far more recently than earlier in his career.
In mid March of 2021, the Heat was 5-9 that season when Adebayo scored 20, with losses in games in which he scored 29 twice and 41 against Brooklyn.
But the Heat then closed last season 9-3 when Adebayo scored 20 or more and went 20-9 in such games this season.
So over the past 14 months, the Heat is 29-12 when Adebayo tops his 19.1 scoring average of this season, a 70.7 winning percentage.
This year’s 69 percent winning percentage when Adebayo tops his 19.1 scoring average exceeds the Heat’s overall winning percentage of 63.6 since the season started.
Miami has won 80 percent of its playoff games (4-1) this season when Adebayo scores 20 or more. As perspective, the Heat was 5-3 its 2020 Orlando bubble run when Adebayo scored 20 or more, and just 17-11 that season when he did.
What’s more, Miami hasn’t lost any of the four games in which Adebayo attempted 20 shots since an early-season loss to the Lakers.
Who was in Adebayo’s ear to be more aggressive on Saturday?
“UD is the biggest person I can say,” Adebayo said of Udonis Haslem. “He can impact the game so much without even being on the court.”
P.J. Tucker spoke of the benefits when Adebayo has this mentality.
“We need Bam to be aggressive and make plays for himself and for everybody else,” Tucker said. “The way our team is built, he triggers the most out of everybody. His versatility just opens everything up for everybody. You’ve got to attack and you’ve got to be there when he gets the rolls. He’s such a force. His versatility, people got to be there and it helps open the threes up, be able to get in the pocket, pick-and-rolls, a lot of stuff.”
Adebayo went 8 for 12 in the first half and 7 for 10 in the second half, attacking Al Horford and seizing on mismatches.
Max Strus said it was “special” to witness it.
“Just because of all the noise and all the criticism that he’s been getting, for him to step up like that was huge,” Strus said. “And we need it.
“It wasn’t just leaning back and shooting floaters. He was being physical. He was getting to the rim. He was just involved a lot more, and we need that. We need him to be involved in a lot more actions and that’s his game. That’s how we’re going to make him better.”
Spoelstra said this was simply a case of Adebayo doing “his version of what Jimmy does in terms of what’s necessary for the game. He was just way more assertive on the catch and those moments in between.
“And it wasn’t just the scoring. That’s what everybody is going to recognize, but he did so many things in terms of getting us organized, facilitating, playing point guard for us at times, running offense in the post through him, and then defending like he always does one through five against a team that presents a lot of challenges.
“He’s a winning player. And he really is the heart and soul of our group…Tonight we needed the scoring and we needed kind of that offensive punch early on.”
Twenty points from Adebayo might not always be necessary, but since late January, Miami has now won 14 of its last 19 – including four of five in the playoffs - when he does.
“We also talked about Adebayo struggling this series, he’s going to come out extra aggressive,” Celtics coach Ime Udoka said. “Put his head down, we didn’t match it.”
And as Strus said, “we’re going to keep needing him to be aggressive and assertive.”
This story was originally published May 22, 2022 at 11:24 AM.
