It turns out the Miami Heat are fallible. It was hard to tell for a while if there was some mortality to a team that executes on both ends as if it spent quarantine practicing the zone and split cuts. But with Gordon Hayward back, Boston’s play finally reflected a team that had both a top-5 offense and defense during the season.
So before figuring out how Boston can stop Miami’s confounding star center and truly swing the momentum of a series that the Heat lead 2-1, we’ll examine how they finally scored against Miami’s zone.
Cracking the zone code
In the first two games, Boston was missing a middle flash with a purpose, the player who would dive in from the wings to try to grab the zone’s attention and turn it inside out. In Game 2, the Celtics kept stepping into the middle and then retreating, as uncertainty reigned on the offensive end. But the key to breaking the zone is to flip that uncertainty onto the defense by passing…
