Overtime perfection, Dragic’s perfect pass and takeaways from Heat’s OT win over Kings
Five takeaways from the Heat’s 118-113 overtime win over the Sacramento Kings, which moved Miami to 19-1 at home, matching its home win total for all of last season:
▪ The Heat does what it normally does in overtime (win) and reversed a disturbing fourth quarter trend in the process.
Miami outscored the Kings 13-8 in the extra session to move to 7-0 in overtime this season. In 35 overtime minutes this season, Miami has now outscored teams by an absurd 86-41 margin. How do the players explain this?
“This team has got a lot of grit and determination,” Bam Adebayo said. “That’s the kind of guys you want in your locker room.”
But Goran Dragic admitted: “To be honest, I don’t know how we win that game. We need to get better defensively.”
And this was also important: The Heat entered having been outscored in the fourth quarter in seven of its past eight games - a stretch during which Miami had been outscored by 50 in the final quarter.
In the past 10 days, Miami lost games in which it had fourth quarter leads of nine against the Nets, eight against the Knicks and three against the Spurs.
But the Heat - down by two after three on Monday - overcame several fourth quarter deficits Monday - by eight, by six with under two minutes left, and by two in the final second.
Miami (30-13) entered averaging 25.3 points in the fourth quarter, ahead of only Brooklyn and Charlotte, and shooting 45.5 percent from the field. But on Monday the Heat scored 29 in the fourth on 67 percent shooting (12 for 18).
“We were flat in the mind, making excuses and not committing to what’s necessary to give ourselves a chance to win this game, with a team that presents a lot of challenges,” Erik Spoelstra said. “We were trying to do it halfway in the first half and the guys took ownership of that. Focus, urgency was much better in the second half. It was one of the more important wins of the season.”
▪ The Heat played nearly all of the fourth quarter without any of its three best wing defenders: Jimmy Butler, Justise Winslow and Derrick Jones Jr. But James Johnson, a skilled defender, helped compensate.
Butler missed his sixth game of the season with a sore right hip. Winslow remains out indefinitely with a back injury. And Jones, who started in place of Butler, was lost temporarily in the third quarter after Cory Joseph inadvertently poked him in both eyes.
“Most pain I ever felt in my eyes,” Jones said, before blurry vision dissipated and he returned for the final second of the fourth quarter and very briefly in overtime.
But Johnson, needed for a season-high 29 minutes, blocked Marvin Bagley’s shot with 52 seconds left in regulation and then blocked Bogdan Bogdanovic’s three-pointer that could have tied the game with 4.2 seconds remaining in overtime.
On the other end, Johnson scored a season-high 22 points on 9 for 11 shooting, including a driving dunk that tied the game with 2:24 left in overtime.
Johnson shot 4 for 5 on three-pointers and is now 13 for 22 on threes since returning to the rotation.
“He has his impact on this game the way James Johnson should, making winning plays on both ends of the court,” Spoelstra said. “Offensively, he and Goran have a great connection. He gave us a different dynamic and playmaking out of the pick and roll. Defensively he did some special things in the zone that you need to be a great athlete with size and instincts to be able to make those plays.”
▪ The Kings punished Miami on the boards and found creases in the Heat’s zone.
Sacramento outrebounded the Heat 49-42 and had 25 second chance points to Miami’s eight thanks to a 16-5 edge on the offensive boards.
Sacramento said it didn’t practice against the zone before the game but repeatedly found areas to attack it. Miami badly missed Jones Jr. and Butler in that regard.
“Those two guys bring length, with Jimmy and DJ,” Dragic said. “They were flashing [Nemanja] Bjelica to the high post and he was making plays or shooting the ball. In the end, we figured it out.”
Despite its struggles with zone defense on Monday, Spoelstra stuck with it late in the game.
“When DJ went out and we didn’t have Jimmy, I don’t want to say it was matchups they could exploit,” Spoelstra said. “But it’s not about the scheme. It’s about the effort and commitment they’re putting into the defense. It was much better in the second half. We were able to hold them to 41 percent [overall from the field]. That team can score, especially when you spread them out.”
The Heat committed 21 turnovers and somehow won despite attempting 23 fewer shots from the field than the Kings.
▪ For the first time in Adebayo’s Heat career, a play was designed in which he was the intended target on a game-deciding play in the final seconds. And Goran Dragic delivered the perfect pass.
Dragic’s brilliant in-bounds pass to Adebayo for a layup to tie the game with 0.8 seconds left in the fourth quarter was a play called by Spoelstra in the huddle and a play that those two players had never practiced before, according to Dragic.
“We executed perfectly,” Dragic said. “It was a really hard pass. We said, ‘Bam, go get it.’”
Adebayo said a play that late in a close game hadn’t been called for him since he was at Kentucky. Adebayo, who had 10 points up to that point, said: “After the first three quarters, I said, ‘Do you really want to throw me the ball?’”
Dragic then connected with Adebayo for an alley-oop dunk 12 seconds into overtime.
Dragic finished with 18 points and Adebayo shook off a slow start to close with 16 points, 11 rebounds and five assists.
“He’s not carrying a hangover over his play up to that point,” Spoelstra said of Adebayo. “Bam put his fingerprints on it at the end of the game. That’s what winning players do.”
▪ Kendrick Nunn continued his offensive surge.
Nunn scored seven of his 25 in overtime, and those points were big, including a three-pointer that put the Heat back ahead for good with 1:55 left and four three throws in the final 10 seconds.
Over his past five games, Nunn has scored 118 points (23.6 per game) on 56.8 percent shooting from the field and 46.9 percent on threes. He had seven rebounds and six assists Monday, but also six turnovers.
This story was originally published January 20, 2020 at 9:05 PM.
