Positive news on Lowry, Tucker
Both players listed as questionable for Game 3
BOSTON — Rarely has “questionable” carried such hope for the Miami Heat as it did when the team issued its injury report Friday for Saturday’s 8:30 p.m. Game 3 of the Eastern Conference finals against the Boston Celtics at TD Garden.
Point guard Kyle Lowry, who has missed seven of the past nine games with a strained left hamstring, including the past three, was upgraded to questionable, traveling with the team to Boston.
Just as encouraging was the listing of power forward P.J. Tucker as questionable a day after he left the Heat’s Game 2 blowout loss at FTX Arena with a knee irritation.
The Heat, in fact, could be whole for the first time in weeks, with the only two other players on the team’s injury report both expected to play. For now, the Heat are listing both Max Strus and Gabe Vincent as questionable with hamstring strains, with neither having missed time with those ailments.
Similarly, the Celtics’ injury report was reduced. Guard Marcus Smart and big man Al Horford, who both missed Boston’s Game 1 road loss, no longer are listed. Smart had been out with a midfoot sprain and Horford had been in NBA healthand-safety protocols, before both returned in Game 2.
Only seldom-used guard Sam Hauser is on Boston’s injury report, out due to a shoulder issue.
Getting Lowry back would allow coach Erik Spoelstra to shift Vincent back to the second unit. Should Tucker play on, after exiting Game 2 in the third quarter, it would not require turning to Markieff Morris or Caleb Martin as the starting power forward.
Lowry initially was injured April 22, in the third game of the Heat’s opening-round 4-1 win over the Atlanta Hawks. He then missed four games before coming back to play two games in the East semifi
nals against the Philadelphia 76ers, with the Heat losing both of those before closing out the 76ers 4-2.
Lowry’s absence was amplified by Smart’s return on Thursday. He closed with 24 points, 12 assists and nine rebounds in Boston’s 127-102 Thursday victory that evened the best-of-seven series at 1-1.
Asked after Thursday night’s loss if he had an update on Lowry, Heat coach Erik Spoelstra only said, “still don’t.”
A team spokesman then added, “He’s making progress,” with the Heat taking Friday off ahead of Saturday night’s game at TD Garden.
“Progress” ultimately came with the issuing of the status of “questionable.”
As for Tucker, Spoelstra merely pointed Thursday to the resilience of his starting power forward.
“If you ask him,” Spoelstra said, “he says he’s good to go. We’ll just have to see. I’ll talk to the trainers.”
Heat forward Jimmy Butler had been optimistic about Tucker.
“I think he’ll be all right,” Jimmy Butler said. “If he’s not ready to go, though, everybody else has to be ready to go. Those are some even bigger shoes to have to fill, because he does it on the defensive end. We’re capable of it, though.”
Butler had spoken after Thursday’s loss of changing his approach if Lowry did not return.
“You know, I’ve got to basically do Kyle’s job and make sure guys are in spots where they can be comfortable and be the most successful,” Butler said. “That’s on me. I don’t think that’s on Spo.”
The question becomes how much of Butler the Heat can continue to ask or require.
“I think I got a bit selfish on the offensive end,” Butler said of his 70-point start over the series’ first two games. “I got to look to use my teammates. They have been there for me all year long and I got to get back to that because whenever they are scoring, whenever they are aggressive, we are a much better team.”