Heat trounces Raptors and keeps hopes of avoiding play-in alive with a win Sunday
Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra doesn’t want his players worrying about the standings in the final days of the regular season — not during the late-season rough patch the Heat has run into.
But after dropping three of its previous five games, the Heat (45-36) took care of business against the struggling Toronto Raptors 125-103 on Friday night at Kaseya Center to keep all eyes on the Eastern Conference standings.
That’s because the Heat will enter the final day of the regular season on Sunday with a chance to avoid the NBA’s play-in tournament.
The Heat kept that possibility alive by jumping on the Raptors early and never looking back, pulling ahead by as many as 19 points in the first half and extending that lead up to 25 points in the second half.
The Raptors (25-56), which have now lost 18 of their last 20 games, never held a lead in the game.
Six Heat players finished with double-digit points led by Nikola Jovic, who totaled 22 points on 9-of-18 shooting from the field and 4-of-10 shooting on threes, five rebounds and two assists.
Heat rookie Jaime Jaquez Jr. added 20 points, four rebounds, nine assists, two steals and one block.
The Heat closes the regular season on Sunday afternoon with another game against the Raptors in Miami and a chance to climb as high as fifth place in the East.
Five takeaways from the Heat’s win on Friday:
Heat’s slim chances of avoiding the play-in tournament remain alive.
Friday’s win over the Raptors paired with the Philadelphia 76ers’ win over the Orlando Magic and Indiana Pacers’ loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers left the door open for the Heat to possibly avoid the play-in depending on what happens on the final day of the regular season on Sunday.
With no NBA games on Saturday and all 30 teams playing on Sunday, here’s what has to happen on the final day of the regular sea
son for the Heat to crack the top six in the East and narrowly escape the play-in tourney:
The Heat needs another win over the Raptors, while the Magic loses its regular-season finale against Milwaukee Bucks. But that’s not all, the 76ers also need to lose at home against the Brooklyn Nets. In this scenario, the Heat, Magic and 76ers would all finish with 36 losses and the Heat would win the threeway tie because it would win the Southeast Division based on holding the headto-head tiebreaker over the Magic after winning the regular-season series between the two teams 3-1. The Heat would be the No. 6 seed because the division winner wins a tie with teams that don’t win their division.
The Heat needs another win over the Raptors, while the Magic loses its regular-season finale against the Bucks and the Pacers drop their regularseason finale against the Atlanta Hawks. In this scenario,
the Heat, Magic and Pacers would all finish with 36 losses and the Heat would win the division based on holding the headto-head tiebreaker over the Magic.
The Heat could actually finish as high as fifth in the East if a combination of both of those scenarios happen on Sunday:
If the Heat beats the Raptors, the Magic loses to the Bucks, the Pacers lose to the Hawks and the 76ers lose to the Nets. In this scenario, all four teams would finish with 36 losses. The Heat would win this tie because it would win the division, entering the playoffs as the East’s No. 5 seed.
If neither of those lowpercentage scenarios transpire, the Heat will be competing for a playoff berth in the play-in tournament next week as either the East’s
No. 7 or No. 8 seed against either the 76ers, Pacers or Magic. The play-in tourney features the sevenththrough-10th-place teams competing for the final two playoff seeds in each conference.
The Heat again played without Terry Rozier and Duncan Robinson.
Rozier, who has started in 30 straight appearances, missed his third straight
game because of neck spasms.
Robinson, who has started in 17 straight appearances, also missed his third straight game with a lingering back injury labeled as left facet syndrome. He initially missed five games last month with the back issue before returning to play in five games and then again being sidelined by the injury for the last three games.
Spoelstra said after Wednesday’s loss to Dallas that the ball had “gotten a little sticky of late.”
After recording fewer than 30 assists in seven straight games, the Heat ended that streak to finish Friday’s win with 37 assists.
The Heat’s crisp ball movement began early with 10 assists on 12 made field goals in the first quarter. It marked the most firstquarter assists the Heat has recorded since also dishing out 10 assists in the opening quarter of a March 26 loss to the Golden State Warriors.
The Heat continued to move the ball, adding another 16 assists in the second half.
Jaquez led the charge with a team-high and career-high nine assists on Friday.
After back-to-back sloppy performances, the Heat also turned in a clean offensive performance on Friday.
The Heat committed just seven turnovers after finishing each of its previous two games with 18 turnovers. It marked just the 10th game this season that the Heat has finished with seven or fewer turnovers.
Like most teams over the last few weeks, the Raptors sent double teams at the Heat’s leading duo of Adebayo and Butler in the post.
But Adebayo and Butler didn’t force the action and they didn’t need to, with others stepping up around them as part of a balanced Heat scoring attack.
Adebayo finished with 19 points on 8-of-10 shooting from the field, 1-of-2 shooting from three-point range and 2-of-4 shooting from the foul line, six rebounds and three assists.
Butler closed with 14 points on 5-of-7 shooting from the field, 2-of-2 on threes and 2-of-4 from the foul line, three rebounds and seven assists.