Well, this certainly has gotten odd.
When Trae Young got on the Atlanta Hawks’ team flight late Tuesday night, Gabe Vincent already was in the seat alongside. When Young got to his car in the airport lot, Vincent had already started it. And when Young got home, Vincent told him he already had taken out the garbage.
No, not quite to that level of the relationship. However, Vincent certainly has seemed glued to Young in the playoffs so far.
There already have been ample moments in this best-of-seven opening-round NBA playoff series when the Hawks’ All-Star guard has demanded screens be set with the sole goal of shaking the emerging third-year Miami Heat guard.
“I just relish it, to be honest,” Vincent said, with the Heat taking a 2-0 series lead into Friday night’s Game 3 at State Farm Arena. “I haven’t even looked at it from that lens. I’ve just so in the moment.
“Even now, just thinking about the next one, the next matchup and what they’re going to do and so forth. I’m just excited to be here.”
The thing is, Vincent, 25, has been here for a while. In 2020, he was with the team in the no-escape Disney World quarantine bubble, when the Heat advanced to the NBA Finals. Last season, he was further developed, transformed from shoot-first scoring guard to combo playmaker.
But mostly, the work came behind the scenes. In 2020, his lone playoff stint was so brief that he failed to register a single minute. Last year, there were 14 playoff minutes.
Now, already, 50 minutes, 46 seconds of action over the series’ first two games, including all 12 in Tuesday’s decisive fourth quarter.
“I feel like we’ve had him for 10 years,” coach Erik Spoelstra said of a relationship that began with Vincent playing under current Heat assistant Eric Glass in 2020 with the Heat’s G League affiliate, the Sioux Falls (S.D.) Skyforce. “A big part of that was he played for us, for EG, in Sioux Falls. So he already was indoctrinated into our culture.
“And then the bubble, he had nothing else to do, except to go to the gym. He was working out, doing player development like literally four times a day. So he really got immersed into our program.”
Now the affable 25-year-old can be found ahead of Victor Oladipo, among others, in the Heat rotation.
“It’s been an incremental process over 2 1/2 years,” Spoelstra said. “It’s not like it happened overnight. And he’s not a 20-year-old. He played four years of college, G League for two years, and then in our program for 2 1/2 years. So, to me, he’s a vet.”
One often entrusted with arguably the most challenging defensive assignment of the series, but a player also capable of producing the 19 points he has offered so far in the series, as many as teammates Kyle Lowry and P.J. Tucker, four more than Bam Adebayo.
“He’s just pesky as hell on the defensive end, making it tough for whoever he’s lined up against,” forward Jimmy Butler said of Vincent, who went undrafted out of UC-Santa Barbara in 2018. “He doesn’t back down. We all respect that, we all love him for that. And he’s a huge key for us, pulling out these two dubs.”
All while taking in the moment, after two-plus season in near anonymity.
“I don’t think I’d say I’ve surprised myself,” he said. “But these are the moments that you dream of and look forward to. Obviously, in the moment, excited to be here, excited to help us win.”
With performances that show confidence correctly placed by the coaching staff.
“I think his confidence is just growing in understanding that he’s a valuable member of our team,” Lowry said, “and he belongs.”
()