HEAT REOPENS WITH A VICTORY
Takeaways from the Miami Heat’s win over the Denver Nuggets on Saturday at Disney’s Wide World of Sports Complex in Lake Buena Vista. The Heat was led by Bam Adebayo and Jimmy Butler.
Behind a dominant third quarter, the Heat resumed its season with a 125-105 blowout victory over the shorthanded Denver Nuggets at Disney’s Wide World of Sports.
It took almost five months, but the Miami Heat finally notched its 42nd win of the season.
Behind a dominant third quarter, the Heat (42-24) resumed its season with a 125-105 blowout victory over the shorthanded Denver Nuggets (43-23) on Saturday afternoon at Disney’s Wide World of Sports Complex in Lake Buena Vista.
It marked Miami’s first win since a March 8 victory over the Washington Wizards, with the season suspended on March 11 amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
After an up-and-down first half put the Heat in a one-point hole entering halftime, Miami outscored Denver 38-22 in the third quarter to take control of
the game. The Heat entered the final period with a 15-point lead and was never threatened.
The Heat shot 66.7 percent from the field and 4 of 7 on threes in the third quarter, while limiting the Nuggets to 41.2 percent shooting in the period. Denver also committed eight turnovers in the quarter.
Using various defenders — big and small — on Denver’s Nikola Jokic, Miami was able to keep the AllStar center in check. Jokic finished with 19 points on 7-of-16 shooting, seven rebounds and six assists.
The Nuggets were without three starters against the Heat, with guards Will Barton (right knee soreness), Gary Harris (right hip muscle strain) and Jamal Murray (left hamstring tightness) all unavailable Saturday.
The Heat plays its second of eight seeding games Monday against the Toronto Raptors at 1:30 p.m.
Three takeaways from the Heat’s win over the Nuggets to open its seeding schedule Saturday at HP Field House:
The day began with somewhat of a surprise, as the Heat did not go with the starting lineup that entered Saturday with with the fifth-best plus/minus in the NBA.
Coach Erik Spoelstra went with a starting lineup of Kendrick Nunn, Jimmy Butler, Duncan Robinson, Jae Crowder and Bam Adebayo in its first seeding game. The surprise? Crowder replaced center Meyers Leonard in the starting group.
The move translated into a strong start, with the Heat opening the game on a 15-8 run before making its first substitution. And the success continued in the second half, with the group turning a one-point deficit into a two-point lead during the first 6 minutes, 21 seconds of the third quarter.
Crowder was effective in his role, too, with nine points on 3-of-4 shooting on threes and seven rebounds in 29 minutes.
But the change to the starting lineup wasn’t expected, as it marked Leonard’s first game with the Heat as a reserve. Leonard started his first 49 games with the Heat this season before missing 16 consecutive games prior to the league shutdown because of a sprained left ankle.
The Nunn-Butler-Robinson-Adebayo-Leonard combination was also the Heat’s most used starting lineup. The group has started 38 games — 30 more games than any other starting lineup the Heat has used this season.
The Nunn-Butler-Robinson-Adebayo-Leonard lineup has also posted an impressive plus/minus of plus-121 in 488 minutes this season. That’s, by far, the best plus/minus for any Heat lineup and the fifthbest plus/minus among all NBA lineups.
But this five-man group with Leonard did not fare well in the one Disney scrimmage it appeared in before the resumption of the season. The Heat was outscored by 10 points with this lineup on the court in Tuesday’s exhibition loss against the Memphis Grizzlies.
Leonard is also still working his way back from a pretty serious ankle injury that forced him to miss extended time before the season was suspended. He scored nine points on 3-of-10 shooting in 37 minutes during the Heat’s three-game scrimmage schedule.
The change to the Heat’s starting lineup had a ripple effect on the rest of the rotation.
Leonard didn’t just lose his spot in the starting lineup, he also lost his spot in the rotation Saturday. Miami went with a 10-man rotation, using Goran Dragic, Andre Iguodala, Kelly Olynyk, Tyler Herro and Derrick Jones Jr. as its primary reserves until emptying the bench late in the game.
It marked Leonard’s first DNP-CD (did not play, coach’s decision) of the season.
With the Heat turning to a smaller starting lineup with Crowder in place of Leonard, Spoelstra opted to use Olynyk as Miami’s big man off the bench. This decision came after Olynyk’s strong showing in the Heat’s Disney scrimmages, as he combined to score a team-high 51 points on 55.2 percent shooting from the field during the three exhibition games.
Olynyk finished Saturday’s win with 20 points on 8-of-11 shooting from the field and 4-of-6 shooting on threes. All of his points came in a 20-point fourth quarter.
The rotation Spoelstra used against the Nuggets also allowed the Heat to give all of its wings doubledigit minutes — Butler, Crowder, Iguodala and Jones.
The Heat had its full roster of 17 players available Saturday, but only up to 13 are allowed to be made active each game. Miami’s four healthy inactives Saturday: Kyle Alexander, Gabe Vincent, KZ Okpala and Chris Silva.
Even after arriving to the Disney bubble late because of a COVID-19 diagnosis, it didn’t take long for Adebayo to turn in a dominant performance.
Adebayo, who earned his first All-Star Game appearance this season, finished with 22 points, nine rebounds and six assists in 28 minutes.
This comes after Adebayo participated in just a handful of team practices and in just one of the Heat’s three scrimmages since arriving at Disney on July 21 — two weeks later than the team.
In the Heat’s dominant third quarter, Adebayo was a catalyst with seven points, three rebounds and three assists in the period.
Miami’s other All-Star was sharp, too, as Butler finished the seeding opener with 22 points, four rebounds and seven assists in 30 minutes. He totaled nine points and two steals in the Heat’s big third quarter.
As a team, the Heat shot 55.6 percent from the field and 13 of 29 on threes. Miami also made 32 of 37 free throws Saturday.