A look at advantage Heat has in playoff race. And more on why Gallinari deal fell apart
The Miami Heat entered the All-Star break with losses in four of its past five games. But as the Heat prepares to resume its schedule Thursday with a road matchup against the Atlanta Hawks, there’s reason to be optimistic about its chances at a top-four seed in the Eastern Conference.
Not only does the Heat currently stand in fourth place in the East with a record of 35-19 despite its recent struggles, it also holds a 1.5-game lead over the fifth-place Philadelphia 76ers and a 3.5-game lead over the sixth-place Indiana Pacers. In addition, the Heat plays a favorable schedule the rest of the way.
“I think we still got a little bit of work to do, but I think we’ll be OK,” Heat wing Jimmy Butler said during All-Star Weekend in Chicago. “We got some new pieces in the mix. Everybody’s getting used to everybody still. In the second half of the season, we got some business to handle.”
With 28 regular-season games remaining, Miami plays 16 of those at home and only 12 on the road. That’s a good thing for a Heat team that has been dominant at AmericanAirlines Arena this season with a 22-3 home record and just mediocre everywhere else with a 13-16 road record.
Among the top six teams in the East, Miami has the most home games remaining to play — No. 1 Milwaukee Bucks (13 home games to play), No. 2 Toronto Raptors (13), No. 3 Boston Celtics (13), No. 5 76ers (14) and No. 6 Pacers (12).
And many of the road games left on the Heat’s schedule are winnable ones. Only three of Miami’s 12 remaining road games come against opponents that currently own a winning record (at Bucks on March 16, at Pacers on March 20, at Celtics on April 1).
In total, just 10 of the Heat’s 28 remaining games come against opponents currently with a winning record.
So, it’s not surprising the Heat has the fifth-most favorable remaining schedule, according to Tankathon.com, based on the current combined winning percentage of teams left to play. Among the top six teams in the East, only Philadelphia has a more favorable remaining schedule than Miami using this metric.
“Winning,” center Bam Adebayo said when asked what the Heat needs to do when it returns from the break. “I feel like this past road trip, we were slipping a little bit. We slipped a lot. We need to get back to winning now and how to build winning habits.”
GALLINARI INSIGHT
The Heat worked diligently in an effort to trade for Thunder forward Danilo Gallinari up until the Feb. 6 trade deadline, but the deal never came to fruition because Heat officials and Gallinari could not come to an agreement on an extension, according to multiple league sources.
The 31-year-old Gallinari, who is set to become a free agent this summer, prioritized years when it came to an extension and wanted a deal that would have included substantial guaranteed money in 2021-22. But the Heat balked at that idea because it wants to preserve max cap space for the summer of 2021 for a pursuit of Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo, who can become a free agent that summer, and others in what should be a loaded free-agent class.
Miami’s thinking was if Gallinari really wanted to be with the Heat, he would have prioritized having an opportunity to play a big role on a contender over signing a long-term contract this summer. If Gallinari would have signed a similar extension to the one veteran Andre Iguodala agreed to with the Heat (two-year, $30 million extension with a team option for the 2021-22 season), Gallinari could have signed his long-term deal in either 2021 or 2022.
The Heat did not want Gallinari merely as a three-month rental because of the draft compensation that would have been required by the Thunder to complete the deal. In order to complete the trade with Oklahoma City, the belief is the Heat would have had to lift the protections off the 2023 first-round pick it owes the Thunder to unlock its 2025 first-round pick to trade to Oklahoma City in a deal for Gallinari.
▪ The Heat announced Tuesday that guard Gabe Vincent has re-joined its G League affiliate, the Sioux Falls Skyforce, as part of his two-way contract.
