Who the heck is Max Strus? Heat secret weapon no longer a secret.
Thursday night in Houston didn’t just happen. The 5-for-8 3-point shooting and the career-high 21 points weren’t merely products of the moment for Max Strus.
Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra made a point of making that clear after Strus and his teammates pushed past the Rockets on Thursday night. .
No, Spoelstra said, what transpired on the court at the Toyota Center on a night the Heat lacked guards Goran Dragic, Tyler Herro and Avery Bradley was due, in large part, to what had transpired on practice courts.
“There was one day,” Spoelstra said, “I literally joked with him and the staff, he had four if not five legitimately hard workouts during the course of a game day. Before shootaround, the shootaround, after shootaround, before the game and then after the game. And each one was a considerable amount of work and intensity.”
In other words, it was a moment in the making out of sight, but with Strus never out of mind for moments such as these, when Herro was put in NBA pandemic protocols mere minutes before Thursday night’s opening tip, and when Dragic and Bradley were left behind in Miami due to injuries.
So there he was, in front of a national television audience, Max Strus introducing himself, a 24-year-old who went undrafted out of DePaul in 2019, had already been cut by the Boston Celtics and Chicago Bulls, suffered a torn ACL while playing in the G League in December 2019, and prior to this season had appeared in a total of two NBA games for a total of six minutes.
“I knew that my hard work would pay off at some point,” he said, after playing 25:10 in Thursday’s victory. “To be honest, to be doing this this early in the season, I probably didn’t expect that. But it’s a weird year and there’s a lot of weird things going on. So you’ve just got to be ready.”
In joining a team months removed from an appearance in the NBA Finals, Strus (pronounced Stroos) easily could have found himself as an outsider, particularly while playing on a two-way contract.
Instead, Jimmy Butler, who closed Thursday’s victory with a triple-double, has made a point of imploring Strus to do what he does best.
“I see him shoot the ball when nobody’s looking,” Butler said. “The amount of reps that he puts in, I want you to do what you’re comfortable doing.”
Encouragement offered.
Conviction boosted.
“Every time I get on the court, Jimmy says, ‘Every time I pass you the ball, shoot the ball,’ " Strus related. “So just having him have that confidence in me is extremely helpful and gives me confidence.
“When you’re playing with no weight on your shoulders, it’s easy.”
To Spoelstra, it is another assist from Butler.
“When you have a highly decorated All-Star telling you, ‘Shoot the ball, play your game, be you out there, get the ball,’ " Spoelstra said, “that’s a lot easier to do what you trained to do so many hours behind the scenes when no one’s watching. It’s a lot tougher to do when you get those side glances from veteran players.”
So, yes, there was the adrenaline rush of beating John Wall for a dunk during Thursday’s victory, Strus’ lone two-point basket of the night. But as the Heat continue their seven-game trip Saturday at the Utah Jazz, mostly it has been a matter of staying true to an evolution that began while sidelined following the knee surgery.
“That kind of helped me visualize where I can be and where I fit in in the NBA,” the Illinois native said. “Before, I thought I was going to be an all-around player. But I realized that in order to get my chance, I got to be a knockdown shooter. And coming back from ACL surgery, I realized that I got to be a knockdown shooter, and I put in the work.”
