{"id":691996,"date":"2026-04-01T14:26:18","date_gmt":"2026-04-01T14:26:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/691996\/"},"modified":"2026-04-01T14:26:18","modified_gmt":"2026-04-01T14:26:18","slug":"heat-hosting-another-difficult-matchup-in-rival-boston-celtics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/691996\/","title":{"rendered":"Heat hosting another difficult matchup in rival Boston Celtics"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"522\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/IMG_0933-1024x522.jpeg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-15492\"  \/>In the most difficult nationally televised matchup remaining on the Heat\u2019s schedule, they are set to host the rival two seed Boston Celtics.<br \/>(Photo via Miami Heat\/X) <\/p>\n<p>The Miami Heat finally picked up an encouraging win in their previous Monday night win over the Philadelphia 76ers. A late run fueled by multiple <a href=\"https:\/\/hothothoops.com\/2026\/03\/30\/tyler-herro-led-run-miami-heat-win-philadelphia-76ers-119-109\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">clutch buckets from Tyler Herro<\/a> secured the victory, snapping a two-game skid. <\/p>\n<p>However, Miami faces a daunting task in hopes of avoiding returning to the loss column\u2014 as they are now set to host the rival Boston Celtics. Boston is currently the second seed in the Eastern Conference at a 50-25 record, following an impressive season in which they were once projected to take a gap year amid Jayson Tatum\u2019s achilles recovery. They are 7-3 in their last 10 games, 3-0 against Miami this year and will aim for the 4-0 season series sweep. <\/p>\n<p>Out of the three Heat-Celtics matchups, this will be the first that Miami sees Tatum on the floor, posing as an even more difficult opponent than what they\u2019ve already been throughout the year. Jaylen Brown has continued his MVP caliber campaign as well. Brown is averaging 28.6 points, 7.1 rebounds and 5.2 steals on 47% shooting. <\/p>\n<p>For the Heat, Andrew Wiggins has returned to the injury report with the same toe injury that kept him for extended time recently. He is listed as questionable, and Norman Powell is sidelined again for the fourth straight outing, too. Wiggins availability will be worth monitoring ahead of tip-off, as his 3 &amp; D efforts would be crucial against the likes of Brown and Tatum. <\/p>\n<p>Tonight\u2019s Heat-Celtics matchup will be nationally televised on ESPN.<\/p>\n<p>Injury Report (at the time of this publishing):<\/p>\n<p>Boston Celtics:<\/p>\n<p>Ron Harper Jr. (ankle) \u2014 QUESTIONABLE <\/p>\n<p>Amari Williams (g-league) \u2014 QUESTIONABLE<\/p>\n<p>John Tonje (g-league) \u2014 OUT<\/p>\n<p>Max Shulga (g-league) \u2014 OUT<\/p>\n<p>Nikola Vucevic (finger) \u2014 OUT<\/p>\n<p>Miami Heat:\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Andrew Wiggins (toe) \u2014 QUESTIONABLE <\/p>\n<p>Norman Powell (upper respiratory) \u2014 OUT<\/p>\n<p>Terry Rozier (not with team) \u2014 OUT<\/p>\n<p>Projected Starting 5 (subject to change):<\/p>\n<p>Boston Celtics:<\/p>\n<p>Derrick White, G<\/p>\n<p>Baylor Scheierman, G<\/p>\n<p>Jaylen Brown, F<\/p>\n<p>Jayson Tatum, F<\/p>\n<p>Luka Garza, C<\/p>\n<p>Miami Heat:<\/p>\n<p>Davion Mitchell, G<\/p>\n<p>Tyler Herro, G<\/p>\n<p>Pelle Larsson, F<\/p>\n<p>Andrew Wiggins, F<\/p>\n<p>Bam Adebayo, C<\/p>\n<p>Broadcast Info:<\/p>\n<p>Tipoff: 7:30 PM EST<\/p>\n<p>TV: ESPN &amp; FanDuel Sports Network Sun (Eric Reid &amp; John Crotty)<\/p>\n<p>Radio: AM 560 Sports WQAM &amp; The HEAT Radio Network (Jason Jackson)<\/p>\n<p>Spanish Radio: WAQI 710 AM &amp; The HEAT Spanish Radio Network (Jos\u00e9 Pa\u00f1eda)<\/p>\n<p>Come back to Hot Hot Hoops at game time to join our GameThread and chat about the game live with other Heat fans!<\/p>\n<p>***<\/p>\n<p>To check out our other content, click\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/hothothoops.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Follow Hot Hot Hoops on Twitter\/X\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/hothothoops?s=20\" rel=\"nofollow\">here<\/a>!<\/p>\n<p>Follow Hot Hot Hoops on Instagram\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/hothothoops?fbclid=PAAaZK-uxa3cMPUQcM2z6aGmK3faJ-G1R7YKtEOcPJNPO4VwfOvw1epBIoCyk_aem_Ad_aZ7zQwWkfVN5rHfd0UkIWrYEnU4j4Ulz0SRK__Qt1738L-NeQ3cZC5voFks7V6K8\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>!<\/p>\n<p>Check out Hot Hot Hoops on Facebook\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/share\/1GUQbKhsRp\/?mibextid=wwXIfr\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>!<\/p>\n<p>Subscribe to our YouTube channel\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/hothothoops\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">here<\/a>!<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t<script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In the most difficult nationally televised matchup remaining on the Heat\u2019s schedule, they are set to host the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":691997,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3778],"tags":[7,5594,144,295,189,3881,6],"class_list":["post-691996","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-miami-heat","tag-basketball","tag-feature-post","tag-heat","tag-miami","tag-miami-heat","tag-miamiheat","tag-nba"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116329919598437099","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/691996","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=691996"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/691996\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/691997"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=691996"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=691996"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=691996"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}