(Photo via Miami Heat/IG)
Despite the roster getting fully healthy, the Miami Heat suffered their most embarrassing loss of the season to the Indiana Pacers on Saturday night. They got throttled with a final score of 123-99, and were never in control even from the very beginning of the game.
The Heat started the game in a 28-10 hole, and they were never able to get out of it. Instead, they drop to 20-18 on the season and fail to handle business against a now 8-31 injury riddled Pacers squad that sports the worst record in the entire Eastern Conference.
After finally stringing together some wins after a rough December stretch of basketball, the Heat recently won five of six games. However, since then, they’ve now suffered back-to-back blowout losses on this road trip.
The Miami Heat have now beaten the best team in the East and lost to the worst in the span of one week.
Miami needs some sort of change. Unfortunately, Tyler Herro’s return to the lineup hasn’t been the answer.
Herro managed to lead the Heat with a team-high, but inefficient, 21 points on 8 of 19 shooting and an abysmal 1 of 8 from 3-point range. He also added 7 rebounds and 4 assists.
The rest of the starting unit looked nonexistent entirely. Norman Powell had his worst performance of the season with just 6 points on 2 of 12 from the field. Bam Adebayo continued to be a non-factor offensively, putting up a quiet 13 points and 9 boards. Davion Mitchell, who has been underwhelming offensively for a while now, put up a goose egg statline of 1/2/1.
The entire starting five was outscored by the Pacers by a combined 74 points.
As for the reserves, Jaime Jaquez Jr. was the only player to make a positive impact. He submitted 16 points and 7 rebounds on 50% shooting. The rest of the four-man bench unit including Kel’el Ware, Nikola Jovic and Pelle Larsson combined for just 10 points on 2/9 shooting. Jovic once again looked out of control and ineffective in his minutes.
As for Ware’s quiet night, he seemingly plays significantly less impactful when playing in a bench role. But with Herro’s return, coach Erik Spoelstra opted to use Ware for that bench demotion once again.
Miami shot an atrocious 39% from the field as a team and 13% from deep compared to Indiana’s 45% and 43%, respectively. The Heat also committed 19 turnovers to the Pacers’ 16, and struggled to control the basketball— allowing Indiana to have a 13-6 edge in steals. Indiana got a balanced bench contribution and were led by Andrew Nembhard’s 29 points, 9 assists and 6 rebounds.
It won’t get any easier for the Heat, as they now will face the juggernaut and reigning NBA champion OKC Thunder on the second half of a back-to-back Sunday to conclude their road trip.
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In other words, this team needs an enema. Whatever happened to run and gun. Spo reverting to small ball, pick and roll and iso and it ain’t working. Maybe his mojo ran out too.
I have no idea what Riley is doing. Haven’t heard a peep out of him. Must be working on the trade of the century or is busy planning his retirement. He should be busy publicly bitching about getting shaft from NBA on Rozier deal… every f’g day!!!
riley comes out before season and after seasons over unless theres a trade..who the f knows what hes doing every day i can guarantee u alot of it isnt bball related.
I would like to hear from Riley more often. I don’t know how often other GM’s give updates on what they are doing, even if somewhat in general, to not jeopardize any potential moves. But, Riley seems quite disconnected from the public. We can only assume his thinking or intentions, which is sometimes good, but not in the absence of any communication at all.