Kevin Love hasn’t made the calls yet. Too soon, he said.
But at the moment, it is hard to argue that the veteran power forward isn’t in a better place. As in the playoffs with the Miami Heat.
The place Love left in mid February, the Cleveland Cavaliers, are done for the season.
“Those guys I’ll eventually speak to,” Love said, “but I wanted to let ‘em get through this.”
It was on Wednesday night, shortly after the New York Knicks eliminated the Cavaliers in the first round of these NBA playoffs that Love and the Heat did the same to the top-seeded Milwaukee Bucks.
Now it’s Heat vs. Knicks in the Eastern Conference semifinals, which started with Sunday’s Game 1 at Madison Square Garden.
For Love, it wasn’t as much about forcing his way away from the Cavaliers when he requested a buyout in mid-February as much as wanting the opportunity for a featured playoff role. So here he stands, after Cleveland has fallen.
“There’s definitely a sense of it being special, especially since ‘18 was my last playoff run, went to the Finals, lost,” he said of his previous trip to the playoffs, while with LeBron James and the Cavaliers. “So I think naturally just getting back in this environment … it just feels like a good refresh.”
At 34, and without a contract for next season, Love is taking nothing for granted.
“I wanted to come. I wanted to win. I wanted to be a part of winning. I wanted to be a part of this and help make these guys’ lives easier,” he said of his midseason career makeover. “And I felt like in a lot of cases I was able to do that. But I was definitely, even in my 15th year, trying to find my way.
“Us being here, advancing to the second round, beating a one seed after being in the play-in, yeah, I think it checks a lot of boxes. Obviously we have a lot of work to do, but, again I felt like I could still play, still contribute, and potentially be a part of something special.”
The pedigree
While the Heat are largely intact after making it to last season’s Eastern Conference finals, and while some remain from the team that appeared in the 2020 NBA Finals, coach Erik Spoelstra said there remains a benefit of having players such as Love (2016) and Kyle Lowry (2019) who have won NBA championships.
“They’re pros,” Spoelstra said, “and I think it’s really a credit to them, to embrace everything that we’re about, first and foremost. That they just want to fit in, they want to help, they want to make sure that people feel comfortable. And they both have said the same thing — just lay out a role, I just want to complement, I just want to help, I want to help this thing work, and ultimately help the team win. And that is unique.
“A lot of times for veteran players that have championship pedigree, you can’t emphasize that enough. But their experiences really show out even more so in the playoffs than in the regular season, and on the road, that they’re able to stabilize the team, stabilize those skirmishes, and just bring a great deal of confidence and stability to their units. Because they’ve been in these situations time and time again.”
Sidelined support
Among those courtside cheering on the Heat in the first round at the Kaseya Center was Miami Dolphins coach Mike McDaniel, not that Spoelstra was necessarily aware.
“I was so locked in,” Spoelstra said. “I wasn’t aware he was sitting there until after the game. And then I was like, ‘Hey, dude, you could have tapped me or something.’ But he saw what we were trying to do and he was very respectful.
“I know this is an important time for them, as well, with the draft. It’s fun developing relationships with some of the other sports teams here.”
For now, there is a respectful distance, texts not shared.
“Not this round,” Spoelstra said. “But we’ve been in contact. We text back and forth. And he was at Game 3. So we texted then.”
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