Beating the Heat

There's a clear blueprint for the Knicks to make the East Finals. I try to lay it out.

Good morning! That’s right…it’s a special Saturday edition, with one day to go before a date with destiny…

🏙 Game Day 🏙

Who: Heat

Where: MSG

When: 1:00 pm Sunday

TV: ABC

Personal Injury Report presented by Weiss & Rosenbloom: Quentin Grimes, who missed the last two and a half games versus the Cavaliers, seems good to go. He said yesterday that if he wakes up on Sunday and feels as good as he did on Friday, he’s playing

The news on Julius Randle is more vague but more worrisome. According to a “hopeful” Thibs, Randle didn’t do much on Friday but moved well and is feeling better. He did some cardio, was in the pool, and got up some shots, but that was it. Ian Begley theorizes that it’s unlikely Julius plays in Game 1, even though he’ll clearly want to. There’s a quick turnaround for Game 2 on Tuesday, but that’s followed by three straight days off before Game 3.

I’ll just come out right now and say it: sign me up or 2-2 after four games.

Halftime: click here to enter.

Beating the Heat

Even before I finish the first sentence of this preview, I want to acknowledge that every word you’re about to read is a complete waste of time.

That’s because in this series, between two teams & organizations that are mirror images of one another in some respects and polar opposites in others, we might as well fast forward past the first 43 minutes of every game. We can sit here and talk all about rotations, matchups, schemes, X’s, O’s, and any other letters you’d like to consider, but at the end of the day, this comes down to who’s making more tough shots in nut-cutting time.

And there will be a time for the cutting of the nuts.

Fact is, Miami lives to play in close games. It’s what they do, and they feel eminently comfortable doing it. It’s not even enough to say that they played the second most games featuring “clutch” situations in the NBA this season at 54, or that they were one of three teams to finish at least 10 games over .500 in those contests, because that “clutch” definition is pretty broad: any game where the score is within five points in the last five minutes.

But what about really tight games? The clutchiest of clutch, if you will? If we lower the parameters to any game that was within one possession (3 points or less) in the last 60 seconds, the Heat played in 40 such battles. That’s not only the most in the league, but they came out victorious 24 times.

Again, this is their happy place.

In fairness though, the Knicks can say the same. New York was tied for the 6th most games featuring regular “clutch” situations, going 23-22 in those contests, and have been in those super-clutch situations 33 times, good for the 4th most in the NBA, and are a very respectable 18-15 in those spots.

A big reason both of these teams feel at home when sphincters tighten up the most is because they each employ one of the premier closers in the game. This season, there were 21 players who took at least 70 field goal attempts in clutch moments. Only three shot above 50 percent in those situations: the NBA’s first ever Clutch Player of the Year award winner, De’Aaron Fox, plus Jimmy Butler (48-for-95; 50.5 percent) and Jalen Brunson (47-for-91; 51.6 percent). Butler also took more clutch time free throws (67) than anyone, making 79.1 percent, and as a result, finished with the third most clutch points in the NBA. Brunson, naturally, was right behind him in fourth, thanks in part to going 37-for-47 on clutch free throws and 6-of-16 on clutch threes.

So we know we’re probably getting a bunch of close games, and we know where the ball is heading in those situations.

As for everything else, here’s what I’m wondering ahead of Sunday’s 1pm tip off…