Who said the Eastern Conference play-in didn't have the juice? Atlanta and Miami just played a thriller! Trae Young sent the game into OT with a layup in the final seconds of regulation, but a Davion Mitchell and Tyler Herro takeover in the extra period (what a glorious sentence) lifted the Heat into the NBA Playoffs via SCORE victory. Whew!
The Heat are officially the first-ever No. 10 seed to make the NBA Playoffs — they beat No. 9 Chicago on Wednesday, and No. 8 Atlanta tonight. I'm not sure if this justifies the existence of the play-in overall, but congrats to Erik Spoelstra and the team regardless!
Updated NBA Playoffs bracket after Heat win thriller
The Cleveland Cavaliers await
Miami's prize for winning a great game is playing the 64-win Cleveland Cavaliers. Kind of a crappy prize, if you ask me.
Miami is 1-2 against Cleveland this season. I don't love the matchup for Miami — I don't love the Cavs matchup for anyone in the East not named the Celtics, frankly — but the Heat will always have a coaching advantage,
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Can Miami do the unthinkable?
Name a more iconic duo than the Heat crawling into the playoffs, then turning into the 2001 Lakers.
Of course, every time they've done that in years past, it's been with Jimmy Butler leading the charge — Jimmy is no longer there, of course, meaning an improbable playoff run becomes borderline impossible; still, I won't forget how bad a few of those Heat teams were with Jimmy Butler, and that didn't stop them from being playoff pests. So who knows? This would be Erik Spoelstra's most impressive effort yet, to be sure.