Heat wastes 14-point fourth-quarter lead in painful loss to Bucks. Takeaways and reaction
Five takeaways from the Miami Heat’s painful 120-119 loss to the defending NBA champion Milwaukee Bucks (38-25) on Wednesday night at Fiserv Forum, snapping the Heat’s four-game winning streak:
Ahead by 14 with 7:12 to play, it looked like the Heat (41-22) was on its way to another quality win. But the Bucks completed the comeback.
Milwaukee outscored Miami 21-6 over the final seven minutes of the game to rally for the victory.
“We did enough for 47 minutes and change to put ourselves in a position to win the game,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “We just couldn’t close it out and that’s the deal.”
The Heat missed seven of its final 10 shots, including its final five three-pointers. Miami also committed four turnovers during the final seven minutes.
“It’s expected to happen that down the stretch, the game slows down and it becomes harder to execute your stuff,” Heat forward Duncan Robinson said. “So that’s part of it. I think the other part is you got to give some credit to them in that they did a good job of being disruptive, getting deflections, being in passing lanes and then also just being physical on switches and not really allowing us to create any separation. At the same time, we’ll definitely learn a lesson of just execution and the importance of it down the stretch.”
Meanwhile, the Bucks shot 7 of 14 from the field and 2 of 5 from three-point range during their late-game surge. Giannis Antetokounmpo scored eight points and Jrue Holiday totaled seven points during the 21-6 run.
How did it all go down?
After the Heat pulled ahead by 14, the Bucks used a 14-2 run to cut the Heat’s lead to two with 1:39 left. The two teams then traded baskets before Bam Adebayo hit a midrange jumper to give Miami a four-point lead with 44.7 seconds to play.
The Heat then forced a miss from Antetokounmpo, and it looked like the Heat would hold on for the win.
But Herro committed a costly turnover with 16.8 seconds left and Khris Middleton came down and made a three to trim the deficit to just one point with 13.5 seconds remaining.
The Heat then called timeout to drawn up an inbounds play in hopes of completing it and getting the Bucks to commit an intentional foul to prevent the clock from running out.
But the Heat was forced to call its final timeout on the first inbounds attempt, as the Bucks’ pressure made it tough for Gabe Vincent as he surveyed the court. With no timeouts remaining, Vincent was able to complete the inbounds pass on the second attempt with a risky lob to Jimmy Butler.
Butler made the tough catch as he was surrounded by multiple Bucks defenders, but Antetokounmpo immediately grabbed at the ball and forced Butler to the ground to get the officials to call a jump ball.
Antetokounmpo won the jump ball against Butler to give the Bucks an opportunity for the game-winner, trailing the Heat by just one point.
Milwaukee opted not to call a timeout after winning the jump ball. Holiday dribbled down the length of the court, put his shoulder into Vincent and hit the game-winning one-handed running bank floater from seven feet away over the outstretched hand of Adebayo with 1.9 seconds left.
“It wasn’t like an easy runner,” Spoelstra said of Holiday’s game-winner. “Those are the most dangerous plays a lot of times. No timeout and they’re in the open court. It’s kind of like a free flowing, there’s not much to think about and you just got to get a shot off. He got one in pretty good rhythm. I thought Gabe was right there, chest on shoulder. Maybe if that’s in the first quarter, that’s a charge. But not at that point of the game.”
With no timeouts remaining, the Heat couldn’t draw up a quality look in response. Tyler Herro put up a 36-foot heave that wasn’t even close as the buzzer sounded and time ran out on Miami.
The Heat lost despite shooting 21 of 44 (47.7 percent) from three-point range — one shy of tying its single-game franchise record of 22 made threes. Miami fell to 22-2 this season when shooting at least 40 percent on threes.
The Heat was without starting point guard Kyle Lowry (personal reasons) in the loss.
It didn’t help that Butler finished with just six points on 2-of-14 shooting, as his final points came in the first quarter. He missed his final eight shots of the game.
Adebayo ended the night with 18 points on 8-of-17 shooting, 12 rebounds, four assists and two steals.
Antetokounmpo finished with a team-high 28 points on 9-of-20 shooting from the field and 9-of-11 shooting from the foul line, 17 rebounds and five assists. Middleton contributed 26 points. Holiday recorded 25 points, six rebounds and 11 assists.
The Bucks improved to 26-8 this season in games that its leading trio of Antetokounmpo, Middleton and Holiday have all been available for.
“The pain of losing a game like that, those lessons stick with you a lot more than when you give up a lead and you’re still able to win,” Robinson said. “Just everything, the execution, all those in-between plays. Obviously, this one is going to stick with us, for sure.”
The Heat was not happy that a foul wasn’t called on the game-deciding inbounds pass.
There looked to be contact as Antetokounmpo challenged Vincent’s late-game inbounds pass. The contact helped to force Butler to the floor, and Antetokounmpo got his hands on the ball to force the jump ball with 9.9 seconds left.
“I probably could have gotten it to Jimmy on the first one over the top when he came toward half court,” Vincent said of the timeout he called on the first inbounds attempt. “But I didn’t want to risk it. I knew I had another timeout, so I called it. We ran a similar action, threw it over the top and Jimmy got the catch. There was some collision, some physicality, landed and got tied up.”
The rest is history, as Antetokounmpo won the jump ball and Holiday hit the game-winner seconds later.
“I’m not going to make a buffoon of myself. I’m not going to go on a big rant about the officiating,” Spoelstra said. “I’m just shocked. I’m shocked that wasn’t a foul on Jimmy as we were trying to inbound. We certainly had some other opportunities to be able to close out the game, particularity when we were up four.
“That’s just the way it goes. I have not looked at that. I just can’t imagine from my vantage point how that wasn’t a foul and that turned into a jump ball. But they still have to make a play and Holiday made a big play.”
It will be interesting to see what the NBA’s Last Two Minute Report rules on the play when it’s released Thursday afternoon. But whatever the ruling is won’t change the outcome of the game.
“Jimmy made a great catch,” said Vincent, who was solid in place of Lowry with 21 points on 5-of-11 shooting on threes and six assists. “Usually that call with that physicality in the air when you catch and get hit, usually that ends up being a foul. It wasn’t and they ended up tying it up. I thought it was a good play.”
The Bucks also finished with a 27-12 advantage in free-throw attempts.
Playing in his hometown of Milwaukee, Herro put on a show for his family and friends before an unfortunate finish.
Herro, who entered as the league’s top bench scorer with 20.2 points per game as a reserve this season, finished with a game-high 30 points with the help of 6-of-10 shooting from three-point range.
But Herro didn’t close the game strong, as he committed three turnovers in the final 4:55.
“I just turned the ball over. I got to be better,” Herro said. “The ball had been in my hands the whole game and going down to the last couple minutes there, I had two crucial turnovers. That’s on me and I can’t let that happen again.”
A group of about 30 family members and friends were at Fiserv Forum to watch Herro play on Wednesday. He attended nearby Whitnall High School before playing one season at the University of Kentucky.
Herro has averaged 25.5 points on 53.5 percent shooting from the field and 48.4 percent shooting from three-point range in four games since the All-Star break.
It was a productive night for Robinson.
Robinson finished with 15 points on 5-of-7 shooting from three-point range. He made each of his five threes in the first half.
In the process, Robinson’s second three of the night moved him past Glen Rice for third place on the Heat’s all-time three-pointers list. Then his fifth three of the night pulled him even with Eddie Jones for second place on the list.
Only Tim Hardaway has made more threes than Robinson in a Heat uniform. Hardaway finished his Heat career with 806 threes, and Robinson and Jones stand at 712 threes.
“It’s humbling,” Robinson said. “Anytime you can etch your name in any sort of record book, especially with a franchise that has the history that this one does, it’s special. Obviously, you want to do it in a winning effort. But it is special, it’s humbling for sure.”
At this pace, Robinson will become the Heat’s all-time leader for threes made next season.
The Heat’s week against some of the Eastern Conference’s best continues Thursday.
After defeating the second-place Bulls in Miami on Monday and falling to the fourth-place Bucks in Milwaukee on Wednesday, the East-leading Heat is right back at it on Thursday against the Brooklyn Nets at Barclays Center on the second night of a back-to-back.
The Heat is 3-7 this season on the back end of back-to-backs.
Making the situation even more challenging for the Heat, Nets star Kevin Durant is expected to return from a sprained left MCL to play Thursday against the Heat. Durant missed the last 21 games because of the injury, with the Nets posting a 5-16 record during that time.
The Heat’s tough week doesn’t end there, as the Heat then hosts Joel Embiid, James Harden and the third-place Philadelphia 76ers on Saturday at FTX Arena.
Even after Wednesday’s loss, the Heat holds a 1.5 game lead on the second-place Bulls in the East standings.
This story was originally published March 2, 2022 at 10:40 PM.
