Currently at the gates of sixth place in the East, synonymous with direct qualification for the playoffs, without going through the “play-in” therefore, the Heat is nevertheless the team of its conference on the worst dynamics in its last ten games ( the Pistons in full tanking being offside)…
With seven defeats in their last ten outings, the teammates of Jimmy Butler (who was in Los Angeles for the ceremony dedicated to Pau Gasol and who finished with 28 points, 5 rebounds, 5 assists last night against Cleveland) are clearly in a false rhythm, symbolic of a campaign really not foliochonne in South Beach and especially worrying when the Heat had a series of six games in a row at home.
An opportunity to catch up on Brooklyn in the standings, or to distance themselves from Atlanta, Toronto or even Washington, their immediate pursuers? Nay, the Heat will only be able to do 3-3 at best if they win against these same Cavs on Saturday…
Last night, it was the stray bullets that weighed down the Heat, who finished with a season record with no less than 24 “turnovers” which offered 29 points to the Cavs who did not ask for so much.
“We knew this match was going to be very competitive, but it’s extremely difficult to win in this League when you lose 24 balls”sadly noted Erik Spoelstra after the defeat in the Miami Herald.
“If we could have finished this match with 16 or 18 loose balls, we would have won it! »
Despite all their mistakes, the Heat were still in the nails under three minutes to play, back to only -1. But it was to better crash in the final sprint, with six missed shots on his last seven, including an open, but missed, 3-pointer for Max Strus…
Finishing at 8/29 from 3-pointers, Miami confirmed that shooting from long range was clearly not the strength of this group, which presents the 28th address behind the arc of the league season with a pitiful 33.6% success rate. On the other hand, this problem of stray balls seems to be akin to a costly mishap.
“We lost 24 balls”, resumes Bam Adebayo. “That’s what made us lose! We were much too negligent with the ball, starting with me sometimes. We lost balls when we could have given ourselves an additional possession which could have changed the course of the match. »
Hampered by faults and limited to 9 minutes of play in the first half, the pivot of the Heat was able to participate in a stifled end to the match (18-17 in the last quarter), a defensive standoff which is clearly Miami’s favorite playground. In the end, it only came down to one shot… and that armful of very unusual stray bullets!
“I thought we played pretty well. We played hard, we did a lot of really good things, but our stray balls are a tough thing to overcome.” concludes Erik Spoelstra. “Especially when we lose these balls in key moments of the match! We are normally one of the best teams to protect the ball. If we could have finished this match with 16 or 18 loose balls, we would have won! But that would discredit what we did [les Cavs]. »
| Shots | Bounces | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Players | GM | Minimum | Shots | 3 points | LF | Off | Def | Early | pd | bp | Int | CT | party | Points |
| Jimmy Butler | 51 | 33.3 | 52.1 | 33.3 | 84.9 | 2.3 | 3.8 | 6.1 | 5.2 | 1.7 | 1.9 | 0.3 | 1.3 | 21.9 |
| Bam Adebayo | 61 | 35.0 | 54.0 | 8.3 | 80.9 | 2.5 | 7.1 | 9.6 | 3.3 | 2.5 | 1.2 | 0.8 | 2.8 | 21.2 |
| Tyler Herro | 52 | 35.4 | 43.0 | 37.3 | 92.3 | 0.5 | 5.1 | 5.6 | 4.4 | 2.4 | 0.8 | 0.3 | 1.7 | 20.3 |
| Kyle Lowry | 44 | 33.3 | 39.6 | 33.3 | 85.5 | 0.9 | 3.5 | 4.3 | 5.3 | 2.0 | 1.1 | 0.4 | 2.8 | 12.0 |
| Max Strus | 64 | 29.4 | 40.3 | 33.6 | 87.7 | 0.7 | 2.8 | 3.5 | 2.2 | 1.0 | 0.6 | 0.2 | 2.1 | 12.0 |
| Victor Oladipo | 33 | 27.3 | 39.4 | 31.2 | 76.1 | 0.4 | 2.8 | 3.2 | 3.5 | 1.9 | 1.4 | 0.3 | 2.5 | 10.5 |
| Caleb Martin | 56 | 29.8 | 46.3 | 37.6 | 78.9 | 1.3 | 3.7 | 5.0 | 1.6 | 1.1 | 1.0 | 0.5 | 2.1 | 10.3 |
| Gabe Vincent | 52 | 26.4 | 38.7 | 32.2 | 87.7 | 0.4 | 1.9 | 2.3 | 2.5 | 1.5 | 0.9 | 0.1 | 2.5 | 9.5 |
| Kevin Love | 6 | 22.4 | 36.6 | 25.8 | 87.5 | 0.8 | 6.5 | 7.3 | 1.8 | 0.7 | 0.5 | 0.3 | 2.2 | 7.5 |
| Duncan Robinson | 33 | 17.3 | 37.1 | 33.5 | 92.0 | 0.2 | 1.6 | 1.8 | 1.2 | 0.6 | 0.4 | 0.0 | 1.9 | 6.7 |
| Cody Zeller | 7 | 13.8 | 63.6 | 0.0 | 73.7 | 1.6 | 1.1 | 2.7 | 0.7 | 0.7 | 0.1 | 0.4 | 2.4 | 6.0 |
| Dewayne Dedmon | 30 | 11.7 | 49.6 | 29.7 | 72.7 | 0.9 | 2.7 | 3.6 | 0.5 | 0.6 | 0.2 | 0.5 | 2.0 | 5.7 |
| Nikola Jovic | 15 | 13.6 | 40.6 | 22.9 | 94.7 | 0.6 | 1.5 | 2.1 | 0.7 | 0.7 | 0.5 | 0.1 | 1.3 | 5.5 |
| Jamal Cain | 14 | 13.3 | 52.0 | 16.7 | 75.0 | 0.9 | 1.9 | 2.8 | 0.6 | 0.3 | 0.6 | 0.0 | 1.1 | 4.7 |
| Haywood Highsmith | 45 | 19.0 | 42.6 | 35.6 | 45.8 | 1.0 | 2.6 | 3.6 | 0.7 | 0.8 | 0.7 | 0.3 | 1.6 | 4.6 |
| Orlando Robinson | 29 | 13.7 | 53.5 | 0.0 | 72.4 | 1.5 | 2.6 | 4.1 | 0.7 | 0.5 | 0.4 | 0.4 | 1.8 | 3.9 |
| Jamaree Bouyea | 4 | 16.3 | 46.2 | 40.0 | 50.0 | 0.3 | 1.0 | 1.3 | 1.0 | 1.0 | 1.0 | 0.5 | 1.3 | 3.8 |
| Dru Smith | 5 | 13.4 | 35.7 | 16.7 | 0.0 | 0.2 | 1.6 | 1.8 | 1.0 | 0.2 | 0.8 | 0.6 | 2.0 | 2.2 |
| Udonis Haslem | 6 | 7.6 | 8.3 | 0.0 | 50.0 | 0.7 | 0.7 | 1.3 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.2 | 0.2 | 1.3 | 0.5 |
