Miami : Since the current 16-team playoff format was implemented for the 1983-84 season, no team seeded fifth has reached the NBA Finals. On Wednesday night (September 23), Miami Heat took one step closer to break that record. Rookie Tyler Herro bagged 37 points in Game 4 against Boston Celtics to boost up his side record a 112-109 victory and take a 3-1 lead in the Eastern Conference Finals. In the process, Herro scored the highest points by a 20-year-old in the Playoffs since Magic Johnson’s 42 in 1980.
Celtics head coach Brad Stevens was all praise for the Heat youngster and singled out Celtics’ shooting in the first-half for special attention.
“The fact that they got multiple rebounds and our first half shooting probably did us in tonight. Tyler Herro’s shot-making in addition to the things I mentioned earlier was the difference in the game. Herro was ridiculously good tonight. I think we played better in other games defensively than we did tonight,” said Stevens.
Stevens added that the Celtics will have to come up with their best game in Game 5 on Friday.
“We didn’t look crisp in the first half tonight and that showed in our shooting numbers. It’s hard to win a Playoff game so we are just looking at how can we play better on Friday. That’s the most important game of the season and we need to play our best game yet,” said the head coach.
Miami Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra explained that Herro has become the player he is today because of his excellent work ethic.
“Tyler Herro was able to generate a lot of offense in random situations that you need against a very good defense. You have two highly competitive teams, so there is not a lot of margin for error. Herro does change the dynamic for us. He is relentless with his work ethic. He has had a lot of tough moments where it was up and down, but he is a worker, he tries to get better every single day,” said Spoelstra.
Spoelstra added that he could see more effort being put in by his players in Game 4 as compared to Game 3.
“They have great offensive firepower so we have to be making multiple efforts. We have to do some tough things. In the second half, we had a lot of guys who were doing tougher things and there were more efforts as compared to Game 3,” said Spoelstra.
