Film Study Breakdown: How Tyler Herro dropped 37 v. the Boston Celtics

The Houdini takes a deep dive into how the Boston Celtics gave up 37 points to rookie Tyler Herro in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference finals.

Jae Crowder wasn’t lying when he told reporters prior to Game 4 there would be adjustments made if Kemba Walker was guarding him while Marcus Smart took Goran Dragic. The adjustments didn’t directly correlate to Crowder, but the Miami Heat found a new weapon. Here is how Tyler Herro found his success against the Boston Celtics.

The Reason for the switch: 

In order to understand what the Heat did right, we must first understand what the Celtics were doing wrong. Watch the very first play of this clip from game 2. Walker is on Dragic. It’s a ridiculous shot, and pretty well defended by Walker, yet someone Dragic makes it look easy and cans the three. The lack of size from Walker made scoring relatively easy for Dragic. That shot doesn’t fly against a bigger defender.

The next play to focus on is later in that same game, you will see an instance where Dragic throws an alley-oop to Bam Adebayo. This play is what is and has been killing the Boston Celtics all series long. The Dribble Hand-Off (DHO). It’s a relatively simple play. In the sequence below, you will see an example of this.

A guard gets a ball to a big up top, The hand-off recipient (in this case Dragic) gets a screen from a forward (Duncan Robinson) before taking the hand-off from the big (Adebayo). The big then rolls to the basket where the hand-off recipient has a choice to now either drive with his defender caught up in a screen or pass down low to a big man–who has been left open due to a switch.

In this case, it was a matter of both. Walker couldn’t fight off the screen and Daniel Theis was caught between defending the drive and the roll. It led to an easy slam for Bam.

Take a look:

This is why the Celtics switched Kemba on Crowder and put Smart on Dragic. Smart could fight through screens that Kemba couldn’t, allowing Theis to focus on Adebayo. While Smart was mainly on Dragic, his role was to basically stop the “point guard” to try and break up the Heat’s offensive set from the start.

In this clip, it’s coincidentally Herro running the point, guarded by Smart. Although Herro’s contested shot goes in, you can see how Smart is able to fight through the DHO screen and still heavily contest the jump shot. This is something Walker was unable to do.

The clip above did two things. First, for the Boston Celtics, it showed Smart was able to fight through those DHO screens, virtually eliminating a big part of Miami’s offense. However, for Miami, it also showed Herro was capable of running those DHO plays, originally designed for Dragic and Jimmy Butler.

With Smart on Dragic and Jaylen Brown on Butler, the Heat had two choices. Run something else, or find someone else to run the offense. They chose the latter, and it worked. While I’m sure Eric Spoelstra had confidence in Herro prior to this game, this game-plan mixed with a little luck was the reason for the Miami Game 4 victory.

Recognizing the match-up early:

The clip below shows Herro’s first basket of Game 4. Notice anything? You saw it right off the bat: dribble hand-off. One thing you may not of caught is who wasn’t on the floor. That would be forward Duncan Robinson–with the reason being Robinson had gotten into foul trouble early, and was forced to sit the bench, only logging 23 minutes as opposed to his usual 30+.

Remember when I said this required a little luck? Well, maybe Spoelstra had this game plan from the beginning, but it’s hard to imagine he was going to only play Robinson 23 minutes without him being in foul trouble.

The reason this is important is that Spoelstra was forced to roll with Herro at SG instead of playing a backup point guard role. Dragic and Herro (and Butler) on the floor together meant now three players who could run the dribble handoff, where the Boston Celtics countered with only two players that could stop it.

Jayson Tatum and Theis? too slow. Walker? Too small. Gordon Hayward? Well, as you see in this clip, way too slow to stop it. The mismatch on Robert Williams allows Herro to create space and hit the jumper.

The very next play, you see the same thing that the Heat were taking advantage of the first two games. Walker, who is now switched on Herro, gets completely outmuscled. With a switch made earlier in the possession leaving Williams by the 3-point line guarding Dragic, this was as easy of a contested two as Herro will get.

I can do this all day, and apparently so could the Heat. On the third basket, what do you see? Another dribble hand-off. Tatum this time gets caught up, as he was both too slow and seemingly a little too lazy to fight off the screen.

This also shows why Williams has been on the bench most of the series. The natural reactions of who to cover just aren’t there. Tatum got beat badly on this play. Adebayo pops instead of rolls and Williams’s first step is in the paint. This leaves an opening for Herro to get a quick shot up.

Herro now becomes the center of the offense:

For those asking why Robert Williams isn’t getting more playing time in this series, watch this clip. At this point in the game, Miami is setting up plays strictly for Herro. It’s a simple screen, in which the Boston Celtics usually switch.

Pause the clip at 1:27. Look at how far back Williams is. He is literally in the paint as Herro is launching a three. Brown is athletic enough to give it a decent contest but there is no help defense. Another good look, and another bad read by Williams to not even put a hand upon the red-hot Herro.

Later in the quarter, Boston goes back to Walker on Herro. Same result, different possession. Herro takes advantage of the smaller matchup, and Williams once again is caught in no-mans-land, standing by the 3-point line as Dragic is on the floor.

This next play was the third dribble handoff of the possession for Herro. If it’s not broke, don’t fix it. Miami was just waiting for the Boston Celtics defense to break down, and once again it did. Wanamaker now on Herro as a hail mary for Boston. Even the smaller Wanamaker has trouble keeping up.

Pause at 5:20. Look at how behind Wanamaker is. Adebayo doesn’t even have to set his screen (which he doesn’t). Easy three for Herro.

The next two baskets are nothing new. Herro simply uses his size to score over Walker. Herro has about 4-5 inches on Walker making these next two shots relatively easy. It’s not Walker’s fault. He’s in the right position, but when someone is four inches taller than you, it’s tough to get a good contest (at the 5:18 mark):

Finally, I want to take a look at this play. After Herro runs to the other side of the court, who is Tatum guarding? He yells over to his other teammates to switch (which no one does) and then floats around in the middle of the court with no purpose. You have to live with the mismatches and Herro hitting shots over bigger defenders, but this is inexcusable. Lazy, lack of communication, and bad defense. This is what gets you chewed out in the film room (at the 3:20 mark):

Herro made a few more ridiculous shots, but they were contested pretty well. These were the breakdowns that led him to drop 37. Credit to Spoelstra for finding the matchups he liked. Everyone was focused on Boston’s bad shooting night, but defensively this is where they break down. Stevens will need an answer for the dribble handoffs if they want to stay alive, and that’s the bottom line, ’cause the Hou-Donny said so.