Ask Wayne Ellington about this return to the Miami Heat as an assistant coach and the former NBA 3-point specialist says “it’s like home.”

But listen to Ellington chronicle this path back to the Heat, and it also is about renewal — just as it was during his initial arrival to Miami as a player in 2016.

Meaningful then.

Meaningful now.

“When I came in here,” Ellington says of joining the Heat as a player seven years ago, “I was going into my eighth season, and my trajectory as a player, I’m not exactly sure what it was. But when I got here, I know that I bought in, and I think I changed that trajectory. I was able to reinvent myself as one of the top shooters in the NBA.”

That rebirth came in the wake of tragedy.

“At the time, my dad had been killed in Philly two years prior to that, and I was coming up out of a darker place and harder place in my life, obviously,” he says of that random act of violence on a Philadelphia street corner. “And when I got here, I really bought in. I really bought into what the culture was about. I really bought into what the coaching staff was preaching. And I put the work in and I saw that change in helping me become who I thought I could be as a player.

“And that connection, I felt like embedded me here for life. People talk about like Heat Lifer and stuff. It’s not just guys that play here for their whole career. It’s guys that make the relationships, build the relationships and grow the relationships. Even when you leave, you maintain them.”

Including feeling the pull during the Heat’s run to last season’s NBA Finals.

“I came back for some playoff games this past year, and when I came back in the building, it felt like I never left,” he says. “Even that, that was a great example for me that this is like a home for me.”

At the time, Ellington was leaning toward more of a front-office role.

Then came a meeting with coach Erik Spoelstra, Ellington’s coach during his 2 1/2 seasons with the Heat.

“We just had some clear, crystal-clear conversations,” Ellington says. “Obviously, Spo and I had always been connected and never really lost that connection. So it just made more sense for me, after those conversations that we had, to take this route.”

One that teammates along his nine NBA stops had encouraged.

“It’s funny,” Ellington says with a laugh, “when I was playing, I got asked that question a lot, ‘Hey, when you’re done, you got to consider coaching.’ Even the different teams I went to, ‘When you’re done, you should really consider coaching.’ I was like, ‘Yeah, I don’t know. We’ll see.’ It’s a lot to manage. But here I am.”

At 35, Ellington still could be playing, two years younger than Heat point guard Kyle Lowry, the same age as Heat power forward Kevin Love. So he took last season off, to make sure the game was out of his system.

“I didn’t want to create any confusion for myself,” he says. “That’s primarily why I took that year off with my family, to really make that adjustment, to make sure this is something that I want to do.

“I had my daddy duties. I was picking my kids up from school and dropping them off and doing all the things in between. And it was fun and it was good and that was healthy for me. But at the same time, that whole time I was doing it, something was missing. And being back here in the gym, I think that’s exactly what it was.”

Now, on game nights, he sits behind the Heat bench, as a developmental coach, working with Duncan Robinson, a former Heat teammate who has gone on to break Ellington’s Heat 3-point records.

And then between games, it’s drilling Heat players in the Heat way, just as he had been drilled.

“He reached out right away, and that was a name that when I brought it up to everybody in the building, everybody said yes, and said it was just the perfect fit,” Spoelstra says. “And that’s from the training staff to upstairs (the front office) to the weight-room staff to the coaching staff, and that really speaks to the impression that he left on everybody here, and somebody I think, also, is a great example of our player-development program.

“He’d already been eight years in and reinvented himself and really had his best years after.”

The playing time with Heat helped him through those darkest days.

This second act has felt as much of a renewal.

“It’s been great, honestly,” he says. “It’s been some weird moments. It’s been some moments where I’m ready to jump in line and participate in a drill. But at the same time, it’s been great.

“Guys are already calling me Weezy, my nickname. So it’s like home.”

IN THE LANE

FURTHER CLARIFICATION: Each time the Damian Lillard story is told, dissected, researched, what becomes abundantly clear is that the Portland Trail Blazers never were going to send him to his preferred destination of Miami. The Athletic provided further confirmation ahead of Lillard’s 39-point debut with the Milwaukee Bucks. “It was anything to go against what I would have wanted,” Lillard said of the summer vibe received from the Blazers. “That part was irritating. Just based off how it was happening, I knew.” The tea leaves were undeniable, he said. “So once it started happening like that, then I started hearing about all these other random teams, I was like, ‘I’m probably not going to Miami.’ So I wasn’t holding on to that.” Lillard and the Bucks play the Heat on Monday night in Milwaukee.

MORE LILLARD: Lillard also addressed being in contact with the Heat’s Jimmy Butler after his deal to Milwaukee, and not Miami, was finalized. “We’ve always been in some form of contact with each other,” Lillard told Fox Sports. “And I said it, initially I was like, ‘I want to go to Miami.’ He was a big part of that. It didn’t happen. I’m here now. But our relationship will be the same. The same respect. It’s just something that didn’t happen. It was out of his control and mine.”

SAME RESULT: For former Heat guard Gabe Vincent, his 2023-24 season started where his 2022-23 season ended. This time it was opening night as a Los Angeles Lakers reserve guard after leaving the Heat in free agency following a trip to the NBA Finals against the Denver Nuggets. Back at Ball Arena, Vincent closed with six points on 3-of-8 shooting and two assists in 22 minutes off the Lakers’ bench in a 119-107 loss. “They were just Denver,” Vincent said. “They played Denver basketball. They were in control of the game pretty much the whole game.” It was a different debut for former Heat guard Max Strus, who left the Heat in free agency for the Cleveland Cavaliers. Strus closed with 27 points and a career-high 12 rebounds, going 7 of 13 on 3-pointers while playing power forward in Cleveland’s 114-113 victory over the Brooklyn Nets. “I think that went pretty well,” Strus said. The Heat’s first game against Vincent is Nov. 6, when they host the Lakers. The Heat’s first game against the Cavaliers is Nov. 22 in Cleveland.

WAITING GAME: While the Heat did not have a decision to make at Monday’s deadline for rookie-scale extensions for those drafted in 2020, the Toronto Raptors did with Heat 2020 first-round pick Precious Achiuwa. Acquired from the Heat by the Raptors in the 2021 offseason trade for Lowry, Achiuwa saw the deadline come and go without a move by Toronto, leaving him as a restricted free agent next summer, provided Toronto extends a $6.3 million qualifying offer. Achiuwa is casting himself as an elite defender. “My length, my athleticism, my quick feet, my speed, my agility. I think that is what separates me,” he said. “I know I’m not an average defender.”

SAW IT COMING: Hours before Cade Cunningham dropped 30 points for the Detroit Pistons in the Heat’s season-opening victory, Spoelstra had an idea of what was coming. Spoelstra was an assistant coach with USA Basketball this summer when his World Cup roster scrimmaged in Las Vegas against a team of emerging young players that included Cunningham. “He was good. At that first scrimmage, he was really good,” Spoelstra said of the No. 1 pick in the 2021 NBA draft. “He made everybody watch. But that’s what you expect when you’re a No. 1 draft choice, you have size that’s unique, you have the full skill set — the vision, the handle, shooting. The way he plays the game offensively, it belies the years and his experience. He comes across as a guy that’s much more experienced.”

NUMBER

8. Offensive rebounds by Butler in Wednesday night’s victory over the Pistons, the most by a player in a Miami Heat season opener in the franchise’s 36 seasons. The previous record was seven, by Alonzo Mourning in 1999, also against the Pistons.