When the Miami-New York Eastern Conference semifinals series opens Sunday at Madison Square Garden, Heat president Pat Riley will be in the arena, a venue he knows well.
He may not be smiling, but he may have one of those all-knowing glances.
Directly and indirectly, his influence is all over this series.
Since joining the Heat from the Knicks in 1995 to become coach and team president, Riley has helped turned the Heat into one of the premier franchises in the NBA with six Finals appearances and three championships.
“He’s one of the ultimate competitors in this league,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra told USA TODAY Sports in 2020. “If you put together a Mount Rushmore of NBA winners and influencers of the last 40 years, he’s on that rock. Just look at his track record. He has reinvented himself more times than arguably anybody else in this league. It always is to put whatever team he’s with in the best chance to compete for a title, and he’s done that over and over.”
NBA PLAYOFFS: LeBron James has last laugh over Dillon Brooks after Lakers eliminate Grizzlies
While the word “culture” becomes more grating by the day, Riley has established a specific standard. There is a chain of command, a player will be well-conditioned, attention to details is necessary, and shots may or may not go in, but there must be an adherence to defensive principles even in today’s score-happy NBA.
It has some aspects of the military, which isn’t surprising given Riley’s affinity for the armed forces.
The Heat aren’t for everyone either. Players have left, been traded and run off, but it can be rewarding for players who want to be a part of it — Alonzo Mourning, Shaquille O’Neal, Dwyane Wade, LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Udonis Haslem.
Now, it’s Jimmy Butler, Bam Adebayo, Tyler Herro (out with an injury), Kyle Lowry and Max Strus. They don’t have a championship with the Heat yet, though the first three played in the 2020 Orlando bubble finals and all five played in last season’s conference finals — barely losing to Boston in seven games.
The Heat belie their eight seed and no one will be surprised if they reach the conference finals again this year. The Heat compete — a hallmark of the Spoelstra-Riley teams — and that keeps them close enough to win games.
Riley left the Knicks almost three decades ago. But his presence is still there.
Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau is part of a branch of the Riley coaching tree. Thibodeau never coached on one of Riley’s staff, but he was an assistant for Jeff Van Gundy’s New York and Houston’s teams, and Van Gundy was a Riley assistant. Thibodeau was also a Celtics assistant for Doc Rivers, who played for Riley in the early 1990s.
Philosophies are shared from coach to coach to coach.
In the season off between coaching the Timberwolves and getting the Knicks job, Thibodeau spent time in Miami during the 2019-20 season. He joked this week he was there to relax and go to clubs. Maybe the first half of that sentence is true, but he also spent time around the Heat. He attended practices, meetings and games to observe and learn.
Thibodeau’s coaching staff has connections to Riley, too. Assistant Andy Greer has worked for Thibodeau in Chicago, Minnesota and New York, and was an assistant for Van Gundy with the Knicks and Rockets. Knicks assistant coach Rick Brunson, the father of Knicks guard Jalen Brunson, also worked on Thibodeau’s staff in Chicago and Houston and played for Van Gundy in New York.
The Heat and Knicks have memorable playoff history. Their last playoff meeting before Sunday’s Game 1 was an easy 4-1 Heat series win in 2012. But from 1997-2000, the teams played four times with the Knicks winning three series. They were physical matchups in which scoring 100 points was a challenge for either team. They were drag-out affairs. Literally.
The indelible image from that era is Van Gundy grabbing onto Mourning’s leg to try to stop a melee between the two teams.
Don’t expect either coach to participate in those shenanigans.
But Riley’s fiery intensity and burning desire to win are present on both sides.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Pat Riley’s influence felt in Knicks-Heat playoff series
