The NBA’s Southeast Division Invitational continues Friday night when the Miami Heat and Atlanta Hawks duel in Georgia for the final berth in the Eastern Conference playoffs.
The eighth-seed game in the Eastern play-in tournament features a Heat team coming off a win in an elimination affair against the Chicago Bulls and a Hawks club that already would be in the playoffs had it beaten the Orlando Magic on Tuesday.
The winner will face the No. 1 seed Cleveland Cavaliers in the first round.
Atlanta earned home court over Miami by virtue of finishing the season 40-42, three games better than the Heat.
The Magic won the Southeast Division, but had only the seventh-best record in the East, so they also had to go the play-in route to advance. The Southeast, without a playoff team at regular season’s end, is now assured of having two of the final eight, equaling the number from the Atlantic Division. The Central will have four.
The home-court advantage no doubt is comforting to the Hawks, whose 120-95 shellacking at the hands of the Magic on Tuesday came on the road.
All four games in the Hawks-Heat season series were won by the home team by double-figure amounts. Atlanta notched 10- and 12-point home wins in December and February; two days after Miami’s second loss, the Heat rebounded with a 22-point victory at home before evening the season series with a 10-point triumph in March.
Much has changed over the four months since Jalen Johnson and De’Andre Hunter combined for 54 points in Atlanta’s December win. Neither will be in uniform for the Hawks on Friday night, with Johnson having suffered a season-ending shoulder injury, while Hunter was dealt at the trade deadline.
Two constants, however, will be the importance of star guards Tyler Herro and Trae Young.
Herro averaged 30.0 points in Miami’s two home wins in the season series, after he suffered through one of his worst games of the year — 11 points, 0-for-9 on 3-pointers — when dogged by Hawks defensive ace Dyson Daniels on Feb. 24 in Atlanta.
Herro was a driving force in the Heat’s 109-90 win at Chicago on Wednesday, exploding for 38 points.
With the star guard scoring 20 or more points in each of his last 10 regular-season games, Heat coach Erik Spoelstra admitted he had a good feeling about the Chicago visit.
“We’re only halfway there,” Spoelstra said. “We didn’t have the luxury of having the one game and then you’re automatically in. Guys feel great about this win and really put a lot into this. This is not something that could just happen overnight. I feel like there’s been some good things happening the last several weeks.”
Young was coming off a 36-point performance at Philadelphia in his last regular-season outing before the Orlando defense got under his skin Tuesday, limiting him to one 3-pointer in five attempts before he was ejected with two technical fouls. Young still finished with 28 points.
Now it’s bounce-back time against another defense that has been tough on him. He averaged only 13.0 points in the first three games against the Heat this season before going for 29 in the March meeting.
“The importance of him keeping his cool, he addressed that already with our team,” Hawks coach Quin Snyder said. “He’s quick to own that.”
