Takeaways from Heat’s season-opening loss to short-handed Bulls: ‘We didn’t deserve to win’
Five takeaways from the Miami Heat’s season-opening 116-108 loss to the short-handed Chicago Bulls on Wednesday night at FTX Arena. The Heat continues its four-game homestand to open the season with an Eastern Conference finals rematch against the Boston Celtics on Friday:
The Heat’s defense was one of its biggest strengths last season, but it was one of the biggest reasons it lost on Wednesday. Turnovers hurt Miami, too.
After closing last regular season with the NBA’s fourth-best defensive rating, the assumption was that the Heat would again be elite on that end of the court this season with 13 returning players.
But the Heat’s defense did not live up to last season’s standard in the second half of Wednesday’s loss against a Bulls team missing two of its best players in Lonzo Ball and Zach LaVine. Chicago scored 57 points 22-of-47 (46.8 percent) shooting from the field in the second half to outscore Miami 57-49 over the final two quarters.
The third quarter was especially ugly for Miami’s defense. The Bulls totaled 37 points on 15-of-22 (68.2 percent) shooting from the field in the period to turn a halftime tie into a 10-point lead entering the fourth quarter.
The Bulls scored at an incredible pace of 137 points per 100 possessions in the third quarter, which would have been the NBA’s best third-quarter offensive rating last regular season.
“We weren’t making multiple efforts and the next-play speed to make the third and fourth effort that was necessary, we weren’t getting to that,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said of the team’s defensive issues in the third quarter.
Without Ball and LaVine, wing DeMar DeRozan led the way for the Bulls with a game-high 37 points on 14-of-22 shooting from the field to go with six rebounds and nine assists. He scored 19 points in the third quarter.
“DeRozan just got fully into his comfort zone,” Spoelstra continued. “He seemed like he was dribbling right to his sweet spots without any kind of duress. That’s not only our defense. He’s a great offensive player. But when you’re dealing with great offensive players, there’s going to have to be those kind of extra efforts on top of that just to get him out of his sweet spots and we did not handle that well. Then we had a lot of turnovers in that second half that just kind of compounded those defensive miscues.”
The Heat, which led by as many as nine points in the first half, also committed 13 turnovers in the final two quarters during their second-half collapse. Miami only had six turnovers in the first half.
The Bulls took advantage of those mistakes, scoring 17 points off the Heat’s 19 total turnovers.
Heat center Bam Adebayo closed the opener with a team-high five turnovers.
“We can score with the best of them. But we got to hang our hats on the defensive end,” Heat star Jimmy Butler said. “We didn’t guard anybody all night. We didn’t deserve to win.”
The Heat’s new starting lineup did not start the season strong.
With Tyler Herro and Caleb Martin opening the season as the two new faces in the Heat’s starting lineup, the five-man unit of Kyle Lowry, Herro, Butler, Martin and Adebayo struggled at times on Wednesday.
In the 17 minutes that the Heat’s new starting lineup played together, Chicago outscored Miami 50-37.
The group started fast, beginning the game on a 21-14 run before the Heat made its first substitution with 4:50 left in the first quarter.
But the Heat’s starting lineup wasn’t as good during its next shift, as it was outscored 14-7 during a stretch that lasted 3:27 late in the second quarter.
It got worse for Miami’s new starting group to begin the second half. The Bulls opened the third quarter on a 22-9 run to build a 13-point lead before the Heat turned to its bench with 5:54 left in the period.
The Heat did not use that starting lineup again the rest of the way.
“I think we had a great start in the beginning of the game,” Martin said. “I just think we kind of fell off with that kind of energy starting off the second half. But overall, it’s the first game. Still building chemistry with those guys after they implemented me in the starting lineup. We’ll work on it. We’ll get it together.”
As for the Heat’s two new starters, both had their individual moments.
Herro, who was named the NBA’s Sixth Man of the Year last season, finished with 23 points on 8-of-15 shooting from the field and 4-of-8 shooting on threes. Starting in the spot that Max Strus occupied in the starting lineup during last season’s playoff run, Herro scored 11 of the Heat’s first 16 points on Wednesday.
Martin, who takes over for P.J. Tucker as the Heat’s starting power forward, ended the night with seven points on 3-of-9 shooting from the field, four rebounds, three assists and two steals. But nearly all of his production came in the first quarter when he scored all seven of his points and dished out his only three assists of the game.
As for the Heat’s three returning starters, Butler was the best among them with a team-high 24 points. But Adebayo and Lowry both had off nights.
Adebayo shot just 1 of 10 from the field in the first half and missed more than a few looks around the basket that he usually makes. He closed the opener with 12 points on 5-of-15 shooting from the field, nine rebounds and two assists.
Lowry was quiet in the first game of his second season with the Heat, finishing with just two points on 1-of-7 shooting from the field, five rebounds and four assists.
This lineup logged a total of just 17 minutes together last season, and the Heat was outscored by 15 points during that time.
And the Heat’s new starting lineup was used in just one game this preseason, finishing as a plus-12 in 20 minutes in the preseason finale last week.
Wednesday was just the first game of the regular season, but it’s clear that this unit has plenty of room to improve moving forward.
The first look at the Heat’s regular-season bench rotation didn’t include any big surprises.
With guard Victor Oladipo not available to play as a reserve because of a knee injury, the Heat went with a bench rotation of Max Strus, Gabe Vincent, Dewayne Dedmon and Duncan Robinson.
Spoelstra extended the rotation to 10 players, also using Haywood Highsmith off the bench. But Highsmith played only the final 28 seconds of the first half.
The most interesting wrinkle involving the Heat’s reserves was that Strus and Robinson, two of Miami’s top three-point shooters, played extended stretches together. Miami was outscored by 52 points in the 284 minutes they logged together last regular season.
Strus was the Heat’s best reserve on Wednesday, finishing with 22 points with the help of 5-of-7 shooting from three-point range.
The Heat’s available players who did not play in the opener were Nikola Jovic, Udonis Haslem, Dru Smith and Jamal Cain.
Butler is still elite at drawing fouls and getting to the free-throw line.
The 33-year-old Butler opened his 12th NBA season with a stat line of 24 points, eight rebounds and three assists in 37 minutes. He scored most of his points at the foul line, finishing 14 of 16 on free throws.
Through relentless and rugged drives to the basket, Butler closed the first half 9 of 10 from the foul line. He went on to take six more free throws in the second half.
This isn’t anything new for Butler, who averaged the fourth-most free-throw attempts last regular season at eight per game. Only Giannis Antetokounmpo, Joel Embiid and James Harden averaged more free-throw attempts per game than Butler.
Because Butler was able to generate so many points from the foul line on Wednesday, he needed only 11 field-goal attempts to score his 24 points. And each of the five field goals he did make came in the paint.
Even though it was Game 1, both teams were already dealing with some injury issues.
The Heat was without Oladipo (left knee tendinosis) and center Omer Yurtseven (left ankle impingement) in Wednesday’s opener.
Spoelstra said Tuesday that Oladipo is day-to-day, but his injury is a bit concerning considering he has been through two surgeries on his right knee in the past three-plus years. It’s the other knee that is the issue this time, but Spoelstra noted that “overcompensation” stemming from his past injuries could be part of the reason for Oladipo’s latest setback.
Yurtseven, who is also considered day-to-day, has been sidelined for the last two weeks because of his ankle injury. He hasn’t played in a game since the preseason opener on Oct. 4.
There was also one notable name on the Heat’s inactive list for Wednesday’s game. Along with the injured Oladipo and Yurtseven, Cain was also inactive for the opener.
Cain is healthy, but he was not made active as the Heat navigates the NBA’s two-way contract rules. Cain, who was a bright spot for the Heat this preseason, is only eligible to be on Miami’s active list for as many as 50 regular-season games as part of his two-way deal.
The Heat’s other two-way contract player, Smith, was active against the Bulls.
Meanwhile, the Bulls were without two key starters on Wednesday because of injuries: LaVine (left knee injury management) and Ball (left knee surgery). Chicago started Alex Caruso and Ayo Dosunmu in their place.
This story was originally published October 19, 2022 at 10:16 PM.
