The NBA’s best coach proved his worth.
The Miami Heat defeated the Boston Celtics 111-101 in Game 1 of the 2023-2024 NBA Playoffs at TD Garden in Boston, Massachusetts, on Friday night.
With the win, the Heat evened the best-of-seven series at one game apiece and sent the series home.
It was a victory that no one really saw coming. The Heat were swept by Boston in Game 1 with a lethargic performance. The absence of aces Jimmy Butler and Terry Rozier was glaringly evident, and the gaps in the team’s lineup were stark.
Just when things looked hopeless, Miami turned it around. Tyler Hiro led the team’s offense with 24 points and 14 assists, while Bam Adebayo paced the defense with 21 points and 10 rebounds.
The biggest factor in Miami’s victory on the night was the three-point shot. The Heat made 23 of their 43 three-pointers, breaking down Boston’s defense for a 53.5% success rate.
Boston was caught off guard by the fireworks of threes throughout the game. Even more surprising than the offense was the defense. The Miami defense that collapsed under the 3-point barrage of Boston in Game 1 looked almost too good to be true.
At the center of it all was the adjustments made by one of the NBA’s greatest minds, coach Erik Spoelstra.
In Game 1, Miami came out with their signature zone defense, and Boston came out with a way to disrupt it. The Celtics used Kristaps Porzingis and Sam Hauser to make Miami’s zone defense ineffective.
In Game 2, however, Spoelstra abandoned the zone defense. Instead of a zone defense, he used man-to-man defense and put Adebayo, the best defender on the team, on Jayson Tatum as a dedicated defender.
In response, Boston took advantage of Brown’s weaknesses by using him against Hiro, who has a weak defense. Brown scored consistently, but without any offense. In Game 1, the Celtics overwhelmed their opponent with firepower, hitting three-pointers at the same time. In Game 2, however, the Celtics were able to keep Brown and Tatum off the board, even if they allowed other players to score.
The biggest contrast is Porzingis. After scoring 18 points 먹튀검증 and grabbing six rebounds in Game 1, Porzingis struggled in Game 2, scoring just 6 points and grabbing eight rebounds while shooting 1 of 9 from the field.
Spoelstra’s defensive game plan paid off.
The postgame spotlight was on Spoelstra, not the Miami players. The local media in the United States began to praise Spoelstra like crazy.
Sam Espandiari, a local American journalist, said, “Spoelstra is the number one coach by far, and the gap between him and number two is like an ocean.”
TNT, the local U.S. broadcaster of the NBA, also praised Spoelstra’s strategy and tactics in its postgame review of Game 2 between Boston and Miami.
In fact, Spoelstra gave the credit for the win to his players. In his postgame interview, Spoelstra said, “We won because the players played well. Hiro’s playmaking, Adebayo’s defense, and everyone else’s three-point shooting made the difference. We need to keep it going in the next game,” he said, praising his players.
Spoelstra has been voted the NBA’s “Best Head Coach” by the general managers of the league’s 30 teams for four consecutive seasons. He is recognized as the best coach in the NBA. In this game, Spoelstra proved why.