Takeaways and details from Heat’s fourth loss in five games and Kyle Lowry’s late-game push
It turned out to be a rough two-game stay in Los Angeles for the Miami Heat.
After allowing a nine-point fourth-quarter lead to slip away in a close overtime loss to the Lakers on Wednesday, the Jimmy Butler-less Heat (7-5) returned to Staples Center on Thursday night and fell to the Clippers 112-109. Butler did not play Thursday because of a sprained right ankle.
The Heat, now 0-3 on its five-game West Coast trip, has dropped four of its past five games following a 6-1 start to the season.
But the Heat believes there are still positives to take away from its back-to-back in Los Angeles, mainly because of the fight it showed despite facing adversity most of the way. Butler did not play past the first quarter of Wednesday’s loss to the Lakers.
“These experiences are very important for your team to go through,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “When you have stress of competition, you have close games, you have a lot of emotions and you have no one else to lean on except for yourselves. These, I think, are great opportunities to improve. As disappointing as these kinds of games can be, you just have to stay the course, stay with it, stay together.
“We’re doing a lot more good things than not to put ourselves in a position to win. We just had two games where we came up short.”
Whether taking an optimistic view of Miami’s last two losses or not, there were opportunities that the Heat simply didn’t take advantage of in both games.
Just one night after wasting a nine-point lead in the fourth quarter against the Lakers, the Heat led by as many as 17 points in the first quarter against the Clippers. But the Clippers (7-4) outscored the Heat 61-38 over the second and third quarters to enter the final period with an eight-point advantage.
The Clippers looked to be in control ahead by nine points with 6:43 to play. That’s when veteran guard Kyle Lowry began his fourth-quarter surge to give the Heat a chance, scoring eight consecutive points for Miami to lead an 8-2 and cut the Clippers’ lead to three with 4:58 remaining in the fourth quarter.
But the Clippers answered to push their lead back up to eight with 1:48 to play.
Lowry had another scoring burst in him, though, with seven unanswered points to bring the Heat within one point with 40.7 seconds left.
“He took over at that point,” Heat center Bam Adebayo said of Lowry. “You definitely can see what he’s capable of and what he has in his package. But I like that Kyle. I like that type of Kyle. I like that aggressive Kyle.
“I want him shooting the ball. I want him scoring because that’s another threat in the lineup. I like when he gets everybody involved. But every once in a while, I do want him to look for his shots.”
Lowry then stole the ball and put Miami in a position to go for the victory, but forward Duncan Robinson missed a potential game-winning three in transition with 15.7 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter.
The Heat was then forced to intentionally foul Reggie Jackson, who made two free throws to bump the Clippers’ lead up to three with just 11 seconds left on the clock.
Lowry made a layup to again bring the Heat within one point with 4.9 seconds to play and Jackson again hit two free throws after an intentional foul to push the Clippers’ lead back to three.
With one final possession, Heat forward P.J. Tucker’s inbounds pass was deflected and stolen by Clippers forward Nicolas Batum. That turnover sealed Miami’s fate.
“Batum made a great play. He’s super long,” Spoelstra said. “That guy has great instincts. If it went over the top of him, I thought that Kyle might have been open for a count.”
Lowry scored just three points on 1-of-7 shooting in the first three quarters before he came alive to record 22 points on 8-of-10 shooting in the fourth quarter during a comeback that fell just short.
“Just trying to win the game,” Lowry said of his late-game push. “Do whatever it takes to win the game. I haven’t been this super aggressive scorer, but I know that I can still do it. I think it was time to try to just find a way to get a win and I had an opportunity. I attacked a lot more.”
Adebayo finished with a game-high 30 points on 12-of-18 shooting and 11 rebounds.
Tyler Herro, who made his first start of the season in place of Butler, scored 23 points on 10-of-23 shooting.
Next up for the Heat is a matchup against the Utah Jazz at Vivint Arena on Saturday.
Here are five takeaways from the Heat’s loss to the Clippers:
The Heat lost its first game of the season without Butler.
Butler sprained his right ankle early in Wednesday’s loss to the Lakers and did not play past the first quarter. He missed Thursday’s game against the Clippers, too, because of the injury.
The Heat did not fare well last regular season without Butler, posting a 7-13 record in games that he missed. Miami was 33-19 when he played.
The belief is that Butler’s injury is a short-term issue, with his next opportunity to return coming Saturday against the Jazz.
Along with Butler, the Heat was also without Marcus Garrett (G League), Markieff Morris (whiplash) and Victor Oladipo (right knee recovery) against the Clippers.
But forward Max Strus returned for the Heat. Strus, who missed the previous five games because of a sprained left knee, finished with six points on 2-of-8 shooting from deep in 17 minutes off the bench.
The Clippers were also short-handed with just nine available players and remain without star Kawhi Leonard.
Adebayo stepped up with Butler out to turn in one of the best scoring performances of his NBA career, but he was relatively quiet in the second half.
Adebayo was aggressive and dominant at the start, totaling 19 points on 8-of-9 shooting from the field and 3-of-3 shooting from the foul line in the opening period to send the Heat into the second quarter with a 40-25 lead.
Before Thursday, Adebayo had never scored more than 15 points in a quarter during his NBA career. He scored 19 points in the first 7:26 of Thursday’s game.
Adebayo finished the first half with 24 points on 9-of-11 shooting from the field and 6-of-7 shooting from the foul line. It represented the most points he has scored in any half during his NBA career.
However, Adebayo could not sustain his scoring pace in the second half of Thursday’s loss. He contributed just six points on 3-of-7 shooting while grabbing six rebounds over the final two quarters as the Clippers began doubling him.
“They were playing him more with Batum and some of their other guys,” Spoelstra said of Adebayo’s quiet second half. “I think our offensive organization in the second half, in general, wasn’t great.”
Thursday still marked just the fourth game (including the playoffs) that Adebayo has finished with 30 or more points during his NBA career.
The Heat didn’t hit enough threes to win, especially without Butler.
Miami finished Thursday’s loss just 9 of 41 (22 percent) from three-point range. It’s already the third game this season that the Heat has shot worse than 25 percent from deep in.
“We got great shots all night,” Lowry said. “We got our goal. We shot the amount of attempts that we wanted to get and, man, we’re just missing right now.”
The Heat’s top shooter remained cold, as Robinson finished with six points on 2-of-11 shooting from deep. He’s shooting just 31.2 percent from three-point range through the first 12 games this season.
The Heat is now 0-10 in games that it shoots 22 percent or worse on threes since the start of the 2018-19 season.
There hasn’t been much Heat zone defense early this season. That changed against the Clippers.
Miami went with its zone look for most of the first half on Thursday. It took a while for Los Angeles to adjust, as it committed five turnovers in the opening quarter.
According to Heat.com’s Couper Moorhead, the Heat had only used zone for three possessions before Thursday’s game.
“I don’t know what his thought process was, but I’m assuming the amount of minutes [we played against the Lakers on Wednesday] and to switch up the flow and kind of change the momentum of everything,” Lowry said of Spoelstra’s decision to turn to zone against the Clippers. “It was working, so he wants us to continue to work on that because we’ll be using that long term.”
It was a Heat reunion of sorts at Staples Center.
Dan Craig, who spent 17 years with the Heat and four seasons as an assistant coach on Spoelstra’s staff, is in his second season as the Clippers’ associate head coach on Tyronn Lue’s staff.
“It’s like, I already know there’s nothing I can do that’s going to surprise him,” Spoelstra said before Thursday’s game. “I know he’s probably watched all of our ATOs [after time out plays]. Everything that we would normally try to take advantage of. But that’s this league, that’s everybody that does a great job of scouting.”
Lue admitted following Thursday’s game that the Clippers knew what the Heat wanted to do because of Craig’s history with Spoelstra.
Justise Winslow, who was drafted by the Heat with the 10th overall pick in 2015 and spent the first five seasons of his NBA career with Miami, is in his first season with the Clippers. He finished Thursday’s game scoreless in three minutes off the bench.
This story was originally published November 12, 2021 at 1:03 AM.
