South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Sunday)
Opportunity to gain playoff ground lost
The thought last Friday was that it could not get any worse for the Miami Heat after their shocking loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves, who at the time had the worst record in the NBA.
It got worse the very next Friday, with the Heat falling 118-103 at State Farm Arena to an Atlanta Hawks team lacking injured Trae Young and Clint Capela.
Defenseless on a night they allowed the Hawks to shoot 53.8 percent from the field, and with precious little in reserve, the Heat not only failed to gain ground in the Eastern Conference playoff race, but lost the season-series 2-1.
When it was over, it had Heat forward Jimmy Butler shaking his head when asked if it felt close to a playoff game, considering the stakes.
“I hope not close at all,” he said, “because we got our butts handed to us. So we don’t want to pretend that that one was like a playoff game. Because if it was, we would be going home, really, really early.”
With a chance to move into the No. 5 playoff seed in the East with a victory, the Heat instead remained at No. 7. which at season’s end would relegate them to the play-in tournament for one of the final two playoff berths in the conference.
“We’re actually consistently inconsistent if you really want to be honest,” Butler said.
After being humbled by the Timberwolves, the Heat responded with a threegame winning streak, even while dealing with a shorthanded roster.
And then came Friday night, when the Heat got 21 points from Kendrick Nunn, 10 rebounds from Trevor Ariza but not nearly enough from their leading men.
In the end, Butler’s 21 points and seven assists rang hollow, as did the 16 points and five assists of Bam Adebayo.
“They had us on our heels,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “I can’t actually explain it right now. That’s just as surprising to me as it is probably to everybody else out there. We’ve been making great strides to put ourselves in a position to win, really defending. And we just didn’t bring it on that end of the court.”
For the Hawks, there was balance and aggression throughout the available roster, as Atlanta kept the pace high and the Heat’s hopes in check in the second half.
Five Degrees of Heat from Friday’s game:
1. Closing time: After taking a seven-point lead early in the third period, the Heat went into the fourth down 95-89. It quickly went south from there, with Atlanta pushing its lead into double figures within the first 2:15 of the fourth quarter and later to 15 by the midpoint of the period.
The Heat did not get closer than nine the rest of the way.
“They just took it to another level in the second half,” Spoelstra said of the Hawks.
The Heat were outscored 23-14 in the fourth quarter.
2. Punchless: Even with the Hawks shorthanded, their bench still outplayed the Heat’s bench, boosted by 17 points apiece from Brandon Goodwin and Danilo Gallinari and 13 from Lou Williams.
The Heat, by contrast, got 12 points from Tyler Herro and just nine from the rest of their bench, the Heat reserves outscored 51-21.
For the Heat, Goran Dragic closed 1 of 3 for three points, Andre Iguodala scoreless on 0-for-4 shooting.
“They were getting to their game, even with their guys out,” Spoelstra said.
3. Nunn sense: With Victor Oladipo away from the team due to ongoing knee soreness, Nunn continued to maximize his opportunity.
This time he was up to 13 points by the intermission, including 3 of 5 on 3-pointers, and kept going from there, with 21 going into the fourth.
He closed 7 of 13 from the field, 5 of 9 on 3-pointers.
But like his teammates, Nunn lamented the Heat’s defense.
“We really just couldn’t guard the ball, collectively as a group,” he said. “We were switching a lot, but they just never felt us.”
4. Three good quarters: It wasn’t as if the Heat were lacking for offense, closing at .481 from the field, with 13 3-pointers and 24 assists, with 61 of their points coming in the first half.
But the turnovers were costly, with the Hawks turning the Heat’s 13 into 21 points.
“Sometimes,” Butler said, “we try to let our offense dictate our defense. It doesn’t look great. It never ends well for us.”
And it didn’t for the Heat, shooting 3 of 16 in the fourth quarter, with Butler and Adebayo each with seven points in the period and no other Heat player scoring over the final 12 minutes.
“When we can’t get stops,” Adebayo said, “that’s when it hurts our offense.”
5. Shorthanded: All the Hawks were lacking without Young and Capela were arguably their two best players.
“You don’t have that sitting on your bench, what those two guys bring to your lineup, your starting point and your starting center, and the way they played this season,” Hawks coach Nate McMillan said. “But when you have injuries, such as we have had, it’s the next man up.”
That meant a start for former Heat forward Solomon Hill.
“They’re going to make you work,” McMillan said of the Heat. “They’re going to make you earn it. And I thought tonight we did.”