How Heat is regressing to the mean. And Wade, Haslem discuss Heat/Iverson talks

Regression to the mean always loomed as an ominous potential hurdle for the Heat against the backdrop of a 14-7 start.

For 20 games, opponents often shot dreadfully from distance against Miami, whether the three-point attempts were heavily contested or not.

On the other end, the Heat shot threes at a clip unlike anything seen around these parts in awhile.

Miami (14-11) stood in the top five in the league in both categories.

But during this stretch of five losses in six games, there has been significant regression in both areas.

Defensively, the Heat allowed 68 three-pointers (on 43.3 percent shooting) in its five recent defeats to Detroit, Dallas, Sacramento and two losses to the Magic. That’s significantly higher than the 32 percent three-point shooting that Miami permitted through late November.

The Kings’ Zach LaVine drained eight threes against the Heat, Orlando’s Desmond Bane hit six (in an NBA Cup quarterfinal victory against Miami) and Dallas’ Klay Thompson sank five.

Offensively, the Heat is shooting just 29.2 percent on threes during this ongoing four-game losing streak, which Miami hopes to stop when Toronto visits Kaseya Center on Monday (7:30 p.m., FanDuel Sports Sun).

So what happened?

“They’re doing a great job of scouting how we play our offense,” Heat guard Norman Powell said. “They’re up higher. They’re two, three steps up above the three. They’re denying passing lanes. They’re trying to make us play one in the half court and then two inside the line.

“So we’ve just got to be better collectively, really working the offense like we were at the beginning of the season. We’re all on everybody’s scouting report in how we want to play, the pace, and trying to slow us down. So individually, we can all be better in how we navigate the offense, attack, kickouts, not taking so many tough two-pointers once we get into the paint.”

The Heat’s 35 for 120 three-point shooting during this four-game skid has dropped Miami to eighth in the league in three point accuracy at 36.9 percent.

“Teams are denying us and making us go one-on-one a little bit,” Tyler Herro said. “It’s just about us making the right plays once we get into the paint. Obviously, we can get in there. But once we get in there, that’s when guys start swarming us and it’s trying to make the right play so we can generate enough threes and also generate enough open looks.”

Erik Spoelstra said the flurry of three-point misses have included some open looks that Powell, Davion Mitchell and others often make.

“We have great shooters on our team,” Spoelstra said. “It was just a handful of games ago we had 24 threes [in 46 attempts against the Clippers]. There will be another game that we’ll have 20-plus threes soon. We have that kind of firepower, but we don’t want to just rely on that to be able to win games.”

Defensively, Miami still stands in the top three in the league in three-point field goal percentage allowed at 33.5. Last season, Miami was 18th in that category at 36.3.

Iverson talks revealed

In Amazon ancillary programming from Saturday’s NBA Cup in Las Vegas, Dwyane Wade said that Heat president Pat Riley called him many months after the Heat beat Dallas in the 2006 Finals and “talked to me about the possibility of trading for Allen Iverson. That’s one of my favorite players. And I love him. And I was like, ‘Damn, let’s do it.’”

“He was like, ‘You in?’ I said, ‘I’m in.’ He’s like, ‘We’re going to have to trade UD [Udonis Haslem].’ And I said, ‘I’m out. I’m out.’ That was it. I was out.”

Iverson had demanded a trade from the 76ers in early December 2006, after Philadelphia started the season 5-10.

Haslem, who was on the Amazon set with Wade and host Taylor Rooks, said in response to Wade’s revelation: “That’s my boy. That’s my boy. That’s why every time somebody knocked him down, who came right behind him and made sure I knocked him down?”

Wade said: “I love A.I. But A.I. wasn’t going to stick up for me. He wasn’t going to fight for me. He wasn’t going to take no fines for me… I was going to keep my guy here.”

Haslem, who first mentioned the Heat/Iverson discussions on an Amazon studio show on Dec. 6, made clear on Saturday that he was aware of the trade talks at the time and “didn’t sleep for a week.”

He said the proposed Heat/76ers trade “wasn’t just [involving] A.I. It was a package, but A.I. was part of it.”

How close was the trade to being done?

“Whenever Pat Riley is involved in making a move, you’re always close,” Wade said.

“Especially for a whale,” Haslem chimed in.

Iverson, an 11-time All Star and 2001 league MVP, instead was traded to Denver in December 2006, in exchange for Andre Miller, Joe Smith and two first-round picks in the 2007 NBA Draft. He went on to play 3 ½ more seasons in the NBA and averaged 26.4 points for Denver in 2007-08 before his scoring plunged.

▪ Monday’s Heat-Toronto game, added to the schedule after both teams lost NBA Cup quarterfinal games, will mark the only Heat home game this season that conflicts directly with a Dolphins’ game (at Pittsburgh at 8:15 p.m.)

The only other direct conflict was Oct. 30, when the Dolphins played host to the Ravens and Miami visited the Spurs.

Availability update

Everyone on a standard contract will be available to the Heat on Monday except Pelle Larsson (ankle) and Terry Rozier (charged in gambling scheme).

This story was originally published December 14, 2025 at 11:29 AM.