Takeaways from Heat’s regular-season finale and a look ahead at playoff matchup vs. Bucks
Five takeaways from the Miami Heat’s 120-107 win over the Detroit Pistons (20-52) on Sunday night at Little Caesars Arena on the final day of the regular season:
First up for the Heat (40-32) in the postseason? A playoff rematch against the Milwaukee Bucks.
The sixth-seeded Heat will open the playoffs with a first-round series against two-time reigning MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo and the third-seeded Bucks. The best-of-7 series will begin either Saturday or Sunday at Fiserv Forum, with the schedule yet to be released.
The Heat now has at least five days off before beginning its playoff run — a break Miami will use to get healthy and also get some practices in.
“I think it will be great,” Heat forward Duncan Robinson said of the upcoming time off. “That’s part of the reason you look to avoid the play-in. Put yourself in a situation where you can get rest in going into the playoffs. It will be a good week of prep.”
The Heat and Bucks also faced off in the playoffs last season, with then-fifth-seeded Miami eliminating then-top-seeded Milwaukee in a second-round upset on its way to the NBA Finals in the Walt Disney World bubble. The Heat won that series over the Bucks 4-1.
Last season’s playoff series between the two teams, and the Bucks’ disappointing finish, will be one of the big storylines surrounding this year’s Miami-Milwaukee matchup.
There’s also the angle involving the Heat’s expected pursuit of Antetokounmpo in free agency that never happened.
Antetokounmpo was set to become an unrestricted free agent this upcoming offseason and the Heat was expected to be one of the many teams that aggressively pursued the superstar forward on the open market. But Antetokounmpo won’t be a free agent in a few months because he instead opted to sign a five-year, $228 million supermax extension with the Bucks last offseason.
Eliminating Antetokounmpo’s Bucks in the playoffs in two consecutive seasons is one way for the Heat to make a strong impression on him.
The top-six playoff seeds in the East are the No. 1 Philadelphia 76ers, No. 2 Brooklyn Nets, No. 3 Bucks, No. 4 New York Knicks, No. 5 Atlanta Hawks and No. 6 Heat. A play-in tournament that begins Tuesday between the No. 7 Boston Celtics, No. 8 Washington Wizards, No. 9 Indiana Pacers and No. 10 Charlotte Hornets will determine the final two seeds in the conference.
The Heat won last season’s playoff series against the Bucks. But what do their matchups this season tell us? Not much.
That’s because Heat star Jimmy Butler did not play in any of Miami’s three games against Milwaukee this season because of injuries.
But if you want to know how this season’s games went: The Bucks won two of their three matchups against the Heat.
In the teams’ first meeting of the season, the Heat was crushed by the Bucks 144-97 at AmericanAirlines Arena on Dec. 29. The 47-point loss is tied for the Heat’s second-most lopsided defeat in franchise history. Miami never led in the game and Milwaukee shot 55.4 percent from the field and set a new NBA single-game record with 29 made threes.
In the team’s second meeting of the season, the Heat came out the next night and bounced back with a 119-108 win over the Bucks at AmericanAirlines Arena on Dec. 30. Miami trailed by as many as 14 points in the third quarter, but closed the period on a 30-19 run to enter the fourth quarter down by just three points. From there, the Heat outscored the Bucks 31-17 in a dominant fourth-quarter performance.
The team’s third and final matchup of the regular season came Saturday, when the Bucks earned a 122-108 win over the Heat at Fiserv Forum. Milwaukee shot 53.5 percent shooting from the field. The Heat lost by double digits even after it tied a single-game franchise record with 22 made threes in part because it was outscored 50-34 in the paint and 17-6 at the free-throw line.
But these three regular-season matchups really don’t say much because Butler wasn’t available. The Heat is 7-13 this season in games that Butler has missed and 33-19 when he has played.
As for Sunday’s regular-season finale in Detroit, it was pretty meaningless for Miami because it was locked into the sixth seed in the East regardless of the result. But there was an injury scare toward the end.
The Knicks’ win over the Celtics on Sunday afternoon locked the Heat into sixth place in the East standings. So Miami sat most of its rotation in Detroit.
The Heat held out Butler (lower back stiffness), Goran Dragic (lower back and right knee injury recovery), Andre Iguodala (left hip injury recovery), Kendrick Nunn (left calf injury recovery), Bam Adebayo (rest) and Trevor Ariza (rest) of Sunday’s game.
In addition, Victor Oladipo (right knee surgery) and recently signed Omer Yurtseven were not with the Heat on the trip.
That left the Heat with nine available players against the Pistons: Precious Achiuwa, Nemanja Bjelica, Dewayne Dedmon, Udonis Haslem, Tyler Herro, KZ Okpala, Robinson, Max Strus and Gabe Vincent.
As a result, Miami used its 26th different starting lineup of the season: Vincent, Herro, Achiuwa, Bjelica and Robinson. This five-man combination had not played together before Sunday.
With the Pistons also missing a chunk of their roster and entering with the NBA’s second-worst record, the short-handed Heat still managed to produce positive results.
Miami shot 56 percent from the field and six players finished with double-digit points.
Achiuwa finished with a team-high 23 points and 10 rebounds. Bjelica contributed 21 points on 4-of-6 shooting from deep, six rebounds and six assists. Max Strus scored 20 points, and KZ Okpala finished with 17 points, five rebounds, two assists, two steals and two blocks before he was ejected for throwing an elbow in the fourth quarter.
“I feel great for those young guys to be able to get out there and compete and also show how much they’ve improved since the beginning of the year,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “In many ways, doing a full year of player development in our program is not easy for a young player. It’s just not. But they’ve really committed to that process and the workload every single day and you can see the improvement that they’ve made and it translates to impacting winning. Even in a game like this, it mattered.”
Herro ended the night with 16 points, six rebounds and a career-high 11 assists, but there was a scary moment late in the game. Detroit’s Saddiq Bey fell on Herro’s foot while coming down on a shot attempt with 50 seconds to play, and Herro immediately grabbed his foot in discomfort.
Herro was able to finish the game and said during his postgame media session that it was “nothing major” and “I’ll be fine.”
“It just looked really awkward,” Spoelstra said of the play. “But he has ice on it right now and he feels fine. We’ll continue to evaluate him when we get back to Miami and see what happens.”
Miami played seven players Sunday. Dedmon and Haslem were the only two available Heat players who did not get in.
Robinson was the only Heat starter who played in the regular-season finale, and he continued a few impressive streaks.
By playing Sunday, Robinson became the only Heat player to appear in all 72 regular-season games. He has actually played in 147 consecutive games dating back to April 2019, which is the fifth-longest streak in franchise history.
“His conditioning, his functional durability, I think is underrated,” Spoelstra said of Robinson. “But he has put in a lot of time behind the scenes. It’s not the same physical player that he was when he first showed up in our building. There’s a lot of sweat and work that he has put in behind the scenes to his body to prepare for long seasons.”
Robinson also extended his streak Sunday with at least one made three-pointer in 48 consecutive games, which is nine away from the franchise record he set last season.
Robinson finished the regular-season finale with eight points on 2-of-4 shooting on threes in 19 minutes. He also closed the regular season with the fourth-most made threes in the NBA at 250 behind Portland’s Damian Lillard (275), Sacramento’s Buddy Hield (282) and Golden State’s Stephen Curry (337).
Butler finished the regular season as the NBA’s steals leader.
Butler averaged a league-leading and career-high 2.1 steals per game to become the first Heat player in franchise history to close the regular season as the NBA’s steals leader.
Butler recorded 108 steals in 52 games. He has finished with at least 100 steals in eight consecutive seasons.
While Butler finished as the league’s steals leader this season, he did not average the most steals by a Heat player in franchise history. Dwyane Wade set that record when he averaged 2.2 steals per game in the 2008-09 season.
This story was originally published May 16, 2021 at 10:22 PM.
