The Heat was the NBA’s worst in one area this season. And it doomed Miami again Sunday
Five takeaways from the Heat’s 117-109 overtime loss against the Toronto Raptors on Sunday at ScotiaBank Arena:
▪ The Heat was the NBA’s worst shooting team late in close games, and it doomed Miami again on Sunday.
Miami, which led by three with 1:53 left in regulation, missed its final three shots in the fourth and shot 2 for 10 in overtime, including 2 for 9 on three-pointers.
For the season, Miami is easily the NBA’s worst team shooting threes in clutch situations, defined by the NBA as the final five minutes of the fourth quarter and overtime with a margin of five points or fewer. The Heat entered Sunday 24 for 113 on those shots, a dismal 21.2 percentage.
For the season, Miami entered Sunday 29th in the league in clutch free throw shooting at 66.4 (75 for 113), ahead of only Minnesota.
And for the season, Miami is 27th in the league – and worst in the East – in field goal percentage in the clutch at 39 percent (110 for 282).
By comparison, Boston is shooting 50.2 percent in the clutch, Indiana 50, Brooklyn 44.3 and Detroit 44.2.
In overtime Sunday, Dion Waiters and Dwyane Wade hit Miami’s only baskets, one apiece, but also missed two apiece. Goran Dragic was 0 for 2.
Miami is now 21-25 in games that include clutch minutes, with the last two (losses to Minnesota and Toronto) especially costly.
“We’ve been in a lot of these games throughout the year and haven’t been able to make enough plays,” Justise Winslow said.
▪ Erik Spoelstra was angry with the officiating afterward, but also with himself.
With the score tied and 10 seconds left and the Heat about to inbounds after a timeout, referee Eric Lewis blew the whistle but then, oddly, didn’t give the ball to Dion Waiters to inbound until a few seconds after that. Dwyane Wade and teammates started running the play, only to find out that Lewis still had the ball.
“You blow the whistle when you hand the ball to somebody when you’re out of bounds, not before it,” Spoelstra said. “That got us moving into motion before that, and then it was sideways from there. Everybody would have liked to see that last play at least have a chance at it with how it was designed. It affects timing of a play, which is paramount.“
Did he get an explanation from the referees? “Nothing that was coherent or that make sense,” Spoelstra said.”That was probably just to levy a fine on me. I don’t care.”
How does it affect the timing of a play when something like that happens? “It [expletive] sucks,” Wade said. “All I heard was the whistle blew and by the time I got to the backcourt, Dion still had the ball. Definitely took us out of what we wanted to do.”
Waiters’ perspective: “It was weird because he was about to give me the ball, then looked down at Spo. Why’s he looking down there? That’s why D-Wade took off already. Our play got exposed of what we were trying to do. It’s unfair. We were trying to get the ball to D-Wade, let him go to work and see what happens.”
But Spoelstra was angry at himself for not going on the floor and calling timeout between the time Lewis blew the whistle and handed the ball to Waiters.
“I’m killing myself for not running into everybody’s vision to call that timeout,” he said.
The possession ended with James Johnson missing a difficult corner three. Bam Adebayo hit a put-back on the rebound, but it was ruled to be after the buzzer sounded.
▪ With their playoff hopes on life support as the game ended, the postgame locker-room was a mix of frustration and disappointment.
“I’m devastated about this loss; these hurt,” said Wade, who scored 21, exchanged jerseys with Kawhi Leonard afterward and now faces the prospect of potentially his final three days as an NBA player.
But there was also some frustration with the officiating, too. “Playing 8 on 5 is tough,” Waiters said. “Every game we’re right there…. It stinks sometimes calls didn’t go our way.”
Said Winslow: “It [stinks to be in this position.] Some of the calls were out of our hands; some of them were bad.”
▪ There wasn’t enough offensive efficiency from the first unit.
Winslow shot 6 for 18 with three turnovers, though he did have seven rebounds and six assists. Bam Adebayo shot 2 for 7, though he did have 13 rebounds. Kelly Olynyk was 2 for 6, Waiters (17 points) 6 for 12, and Dragic 4 for 12.
That’s 33.9 percent shooting and 54 points from your starters, with none making even half his shots.
▪ The Heat finds itself in an unusual position for them – guaranteed to have a losing record this season.
At 38-42, Miami is assured of having a losing record for only the second time in the past 11 seasons and first time since going 37-45 in 2014-15. The Heat fell to 2-15 against the top five teams in the East, with one more of those (Tuesday against Philadelphia).
The Heat cut Rodney McGruder after the game. The details and why it happened are here.
Heat playoff update at 7:10 p.m. Sunday: In order to qualify for postseason, Miami needs to win its final two games (Philadelphia, at Brooklyn) and Detroit needs to lose its final two (Memphis, at the Knicks), and Charlotte needs to lose one of its final two (at Cleveland, Orlando).
This story was originally published April 7, 2019 at 4:34 PM.