With No. 1 seed already clinched, Heat still play regulars and defeats Hawks. Takeaways
The Miami Heat and Atlanta Hawks could meet in a high-stakes playoff series later this month. But Friday’s matchup between the two teams meant a lot more to the Hawks.
The Heat entered with the No. 1 playoff seed in the Eastern Conference already secured, while the Hawks are still battling for the best possible seed in next week’s play-in tournament.
RELATED: Heat clinches top seed in East for fourth time in franchise history
Despite having much less to play for, the Heat (53-28) came away with a 113-109 win over the Hawks (42-39) on Friday night at FTX Arena to extend its winning streak to six games. Atlanta is one of four potential first-round opponents for the Heat, which will open the playoffs on April 17.
The Heat rallied for the victory, as it trailed by six points with 5:18 to play. Miami closed the game on a 16-6 run to complete the comeback.
“It was great just to find a way to gut out a close game, competitive game” said Heat coach Erik Spoelstra, who returned after missing the previous two games while in the NBA’s COVID-19 protocols. “If I could have scripted it, this is what it would be. Back and forth, lead changes, trying to find different solutions, having to step up with a little bit of adversity.”
The game-deciding possession came with the score tied at 109 and less than a minute remaining. Heat guard Kyle Lowry drove into the paint to draw an extra defender before dishing it to center Bam Adebayo for a dunk to put Miami ahead by two points with 27.1 seconds left.
Hawks forward Danilo Gallinari missed a three on the other end with 11.1 seconds to play.
Tyler Herro went on to make two free throws after being intentionally fouled to seal the win for the Heat.
Adebayo, Jimmy Butler, Herro and Lowry combined for 19 of the Heat’s 22 fourth-quarter points.
Adebayo ended the night with 24 points on 8-of-14 shooting from the field and 8-of-10 shooting from the foul line, six rebounds and four assists.
Butler finished with 20 points with the help of 10-of-12 shooting from the foul line, four rebounds, one assist and one steal.
Herro scored 15 points and dished out nine assists off the bench.
Lowry contributed 16 points, five rebounds, three assists and two steals.
The Heat overcame a 35-point performance from Hawks guard Trae Young, who shot 12 of 23 from the field and 8 of 8 from the foul line. But Young was just 3 of 12 from the field in the second half.
Next up for the Heat is its regular-season finale on Sunday against the Orlando Magic at Amway Center.
Here are five takeaways from the Heat’s win over the Hawks:
Even with the East’s No. 1 playoff seed already clinched, the Heat still played its regulars against the Hawks.
The Heat was only without two players in its second-to-last game of the regular season: P.J. Tucker (right calf strain) and Omer Yurtseven (non-COVID illness).
That meant Lowry, Max Strus, Butler, Caleb Martin and Adebayo started the game for the Heat.
And the bench rotation included regulars Herro, Dewayne Dedmon, Gabe Vincent and Duncan Robinson.
Adebayo, Butler, Lowry and Herro each played more than 30 minutes. Butler logged a team-high 37 minutes.
The expectation is most, if not all, of the Heat’s regulars will be held out of Sunday’s regular-season finale in Orlando.
Why did the Heat play its regulars on Friday in a relatively meaningless game?
“It’s something we just discussed this morning,” Spoelstra said. “It’s a little bit unusual because of the play-in that we’ll have a little bit more time off and everybody wanted to compete tonight. We won’t play our first playoff game until April 17th or whenever.”
The Heat will have six full days off for rest and preparation between its final regular-season game on Sunday and its first playoff game on Sunday, April 17 to give time for next week’s play-in tournament to be completed.
“I think it was one of those things where we knew we have some time off and we won’t have a real competitive basketball game for a while,” Lowry said. “... What it showed for us is we take every game serious, no matter what the situation is, what the time is. We want to win the basketball game.”
The last thing the Heat wanted to see in a game like Friday’s was an injury. There was a scare, but it proved to be a false alarm.
With 8:50 left in the fourth quarter, Dedmon limped off the court during a timeout and headed directly to the locker room while holding his right leg. Dedmon never returned but it seems that he avoided the worst, as Spoelstra said “he was just getting his ankle re-taped and he was actually available if we needed him.”
Dedmon, 32, recorded three points and four rebounds in 15 minutes off the bench before injuring his leg.
The rest of those who played for the Heat in Friday’s win seemed to come away from the game without an issue.
Martin started in Tucker’s place, as the Heat prepares for the possibility of beginning the playoffs without Tucker.
The Heat’s hope is that Tucker will be ready to return for the start of the postseason next week, but there’s no guarantee.
Tucker, 36, will miss Miami’s final two regular-season games after suffering a a right calf strain in Tuesday’s win over the Charlotte Hornets. He’ll be re-evaluated next week ahead of the playoffs.
According to VeryWell Health, a grade 1 calf strain usually heals in seven to 10 days, a grade 2 calf strain takes about four to six weeks to heal and a grade 3 calf strain can take about three months to heal. Tucker’s injury is considered to be a grade 1 calf strain or the least severe on that scale, according to a league source.
But in case Tucker isn’t ready for the start of the playoffs, it looks like Martin will be relied on to help fill the void.
Starting in Tucker’s spot on Friday, Martin finished with eight points, four rebounds and one assist.
Veteran forward Markieff Morris is another option to help fill Tucker’s void, but he did not play on Friday.
One day after securing the top playoff seed in the East, the Heat spoke about the accomplishment.
“It does mean something,” Spoelstra said. “I think you can take gratitude from that and gratification from a meaningful regular season. It’s not everything, but it definitely is something. I think it’s always good to shoot for something in this league and to compete for something. It wasn’t something that we were talking about every single day. But we talked about learning how to win and to do it without excuses and to do it with a lot of different things that were coming our way this year and the adversities and guys in and out of the lineup.”
With the No. 1 seed, the Heat owns home-court advantage through at least the first three rounds of the playoffs. That means a potential Game 7 would be played at FTX Arena against any East playoff opponent.
This marks just the fourth time that Heat will enter the postseason as the top seed. Miami also pulled it off in the 2012-13, 2004-05 and 1998-99 seasons.
“What made this one special from a regular-season standpoint is the fact that literally every player in that locker room had their fingerprints on wins at some point during the season,” Spoelstra continued. “It took everybody, everybody on the roster, the full roster to be able to manage the injuries and missed games and all of that and still find ways to win. I think that’s something that we can all feel gratification for and all feel that we contributed to it.”
While the Heat knows it will open the playoffs on April 17 at FTX Arena, it won’t know its first-round opponent until next Friday at the end of the play-in tournament. The Heat’s four potential first-round opponents are the Brooklyn Nets, Cleveland Cavaliers, Hawks and Charlotte Hornets.
“It just shows the grit, the grind, the effort, the days where I’m out, Jimmy is out, Tyler is out, P.J. is out, Kyle is out,” Adebayo said of clinching the top playoff seed in the East. “It just shows that this group is competitive. To clinch the No. 1 spot and the majority of the starting five has missed 15-plus games individually. It just shows the growth of this team.”
Friday’s game didn’t affect the Heat’s position in the East standings, but the result could impact the play-in tournament that will determine its first-round playoff opponent.
If the Heat is looking to avoid Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving and the Nets in the first round, Friday was a productive night.
The Hawks dropped to ninth place after losing to the Heat, while the Nets moved up to seventh with Friday’s win over the Cavaliers.
At the end of Friday’s slate of games, the four teams involved in the play-in tournament were seeded this way: No. 7 Nets, No. 8 Cavaliers, No. 9 Hawks and No. 10 Hornets.
The Nets can clinch seventh place in the East by winning its final regular-season game on Sunday against the Pacers in Brooklyn.
“I was never good at math and I’ve had everybody explain all the different scenarios,” Spoelstra said when asked if he pays attention to the storylines surrounding the play-in tournament. “That’s when you’ll lose me in 30 seconds. I just want to know, are we going to win this game or are we not? That’s how we went into this game, let’s go win this. It kind of simplifies everything. All the trigonometry, that’s for everybody else. It will play out the way it’s supposed to play out.”
Brooklyn finishing in seventh place doesn’t eliminate the possibility of a first-round matchup against Miami, but it does reduce the chances of a Heat-Nets series.
Why? By finishing the regular season in seventh place, the Nets would host a play-in matchup against the East’s eighth-place team. A victory in that game would clinch the seventh seed in the East and a playoff series against the second seed, avoiding the top-seeded Heat.
By finishing the regular season in ninth or 10th place in the East, the Nets would only be able to get into the playoffs as the eighth seed that will face the Heat in the first round.
The two teams currently in the Heat’s bracket as a potential second-round opponent are the fourth-seeded Philadelphia 76ers and fifth-seeded Toronto Raptors.
This story was originally published April 8, 2022 at 10:36 PM.
