Tyler Herro’s return to the lineup has produced immediate results for the Miami Heat, who face the visiting Philadelphia 76ers on Monday.
Herro appears to be in midseason form after missing 18 games due to a sprained right ankle. The fifth-year pro is averaging 27.7 points per game on 55.4 percent shooting — including 12-of-24 (50 percent) from 3-point range — in his first three games back.
Miami has won its past two games without star Jimmy Butler, who is listed as questionable for Monday’s contest due to a strained left calf.
Butler’s absence hasn’t altered Miami’s style of play. The Heat are the league’s top 3-point shooting team at 39.6 percent and boast a pair of sharp-shooters, Herro and Duncan Robinson.
Herro scored 30 points in a 122-113 win over the Atlanta Hawks on Friday, while Robinson had 21 of his 27 points in the fourth quarter. Miami shot 17 of 39 (43.6 percent) from beyond the arc in the victory.
“You just see the benefits when both (Herro and Robinson) are on the court together,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “There’s a lot of things that can go wrong for a defense with those two guys.
“You’re going to overreact at some point because of their skill level and they did a lot of good things down the stretch on both ends of the court.”
Herro has been limited to just 11 games this season but is playing well when he is on the court. Herro is averaging career-highs in points (24.2 per game), assists (4.4) and steals (1.3).
“He’s relentless with his work. That’s what you really have to appreciate about Tyler,” Spoelstra said. “This is not something that just happened with talent. This is a lot of sweat equity behind the scenes.”
The Heat will need another strong shooting night against Philadelphia, which has won eight of its past nine games.
The Sixers are monitoring the status of center Joel Embiid after the reigning league MVP sprained his right ankle in a 121-111 victory over the Toronto Raptors on Friday.
Philadelphia coach Nick Nurse did not sound overly concerned about the injury to Embiid, who is averaging a league-high 35.0 points per game with 11.7 rebounds, 6.0 assists and 2.0 blocks per game.
“We are seeing something pretty cool right in front of us, right now,” Nurse said. “I heard him say a week or so ago, or maybe 10 days ago, that his mindset is to go out there and dominate every single night.”
Embiid played through the injury to deliver another dominant performance against Toronto with 31 points and 10 rebounds. He also extended his streak of 30-point, 10-rebound games to 13, which is the longest in the NBA since Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s 16-game streak in 1971-72.
Teammates have run out of superlatives for Embiid, who has scored at least 30 points in 14 consecutive games.
“I think he’s better than people know,” Sixers forward Marcus Morris Sr. said. “Being in the league for a while and seeing it up close now, it’s crazy different than what I ever saw.
“He’s different. It ain’t even about scoring, man. (He) plays defense, he helps guys protect the rim. So he’s doing it on both sides of the ball. I don’t know any superstar that’s willing to put their body on the line day in and day out like that, like literally.”
–Field Level Media