The Miami Heat dominated the tanking, injury-riddled Memphis Grizzlies with a 136-120 inside Kaseya Center Saturday night.
Many will remember the game because of the Myron Gardner-Scotty Pippen Jr. brawl with 1:55 left in the fourth quarter, but that’s neither here nor there.
Actually, let’s rewind it once more, because it was epic; Gardner, who was rightfully ejected, did instigate it, and he’s been in involved in plenty of scuffles over the last 15 or so games. But he rules, point blank.
The game was beyond out of reach at the time of the incident. Miami outscored Memphis 61-42 over the first 22 minutes in the second half before the Grizzlies did enough leg work to make the score a little more respectable over the final 1:59.
Andrew Wiggins led the Heat with 28 points on 9-of-10 shooting, including a perfect 4-of-4 from 3-point range. He also grabbed seven rebounds with three assists and a steal in 29 minutes. Norman Powell bounced back after a rough game Friday, scoring 25 points on 10-of-16 shooting with six dimes.
Tyler Herro, who picked up right where he left off (before cooling down), finished with 14 points in his second consecutive game coming off the bench. We’ll see how long he remains on the bench, but the Heat’s lineup looks infinitely more balanced when he is. Kel’el Ware had 11 points and 15 rebounds in 19 minutes; Jaime Jaquez Jr. tallied 12 points and five rebounds on 5-of-12 shooting; Bam Adebayo had 13 points, six rebounds and five assists.
Starting in place of an injured Davion Mitchell, Heat rookie Kasparas Jakucionis scored 12 points with five assists on 4-of-6 shooting. He remained hot from 3-point range, knocking down two of his three attempts.
The Heat’s 16-point win over Memphis moved them to the No. 7 seed in the East, improving their record to 31-27. Their three-game win streak was the longest in nearly two months; they won four-straight from Dec. 26-Jan. 1.
Miami has largely been inconsistent this year. Though it’s doing what it should: Beat up on bad teams, as evidenced by its 4-1 stretch against Washington, New Orleans, Atlanta and now Memphis. Three of those teams are outright tanking; Miami’s lone loss came to Utah, who’s also blatanly tanking — arguably its worst loss of the season to date.
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is jovic a top 10 player all time?if not def top 15 .
He’s not even top 10 on the Heat.
Haha!
As far as Jokic, I would definitely not consider him top 10-15 all time. Someone would have to have a short memory to think so. There have been a lot of unbelievable players over the last 50 years or so.
Not many big men in NBA history who have the overall skills and stats. Look them up.
how did okc get hartenstHein and not pat how did cleve get allen and not pat.pat gtfoh tired of your gming old man
That was fast, we are close to 6th now.
Those two are not strong teams, but things looks a bit up right now.
That win was very nice but maybe even bigger was Orlando’s loss and Philly’s perplexing fall from grace. They got spanked by a tanker. Without Embiid they really are slightly below mediocre. I didn’t realize how much he carries that team. And if you look at Orlando’s schedule, it seems difficult to envision them keeping up. Sixth seed seems very possible now.
Tony Jones (76ers reporter) said that the heavy minutes are catching up with the team and Maxey has hit a wall (he’s first in the NBA in minutes per game at 38.6)
That was Andrew’s finest game as a Heat player. He is a heck of a player. Give him some slack when he has an occasional off night as he does so much more than just scoring. But, he scores a lot on two out of three games. There really should be no consideration of not extending both Wiggins and Powell. We are lucky to have them. Powell is a low A player and Wiggins a low A-. They both could be cornerstone pieces on a championship contender.
I’m more a B+ and B on those 2. On a contender, I see Powell as a #2 and Wiggins as a #3 or even 4. Wiggins is the consummate professional, a glue guy with a steady all around game. He’s one of the more mellow players I’ve ever seen. I said to my better half last night that if anyone doesn’t like him, there’s something wrong with them.
gardner not sure if pippen provoked u by why do that.i love u as a player think u deserve minutes every night but that was not a good look.was it because 30 said u had a friendly face?
On the previous play Gardner crashes for an OREB and runs into Pippen Jr, and then Pippen Jr pulls him down as he is in the air (dirty play). Refs missed that but should have called a flagrant 1/tech on Gardner’s response and that would have been the end of it
He does. Even after the scuffle he looked like a nice guy who doesn’t mind an altercation every so often.
Try reading 2015’s take on the issue. Instead of just going after Gardner for that dumb play, try being fair about what came before and after. They were both thrown out for a reason. The were both wrong.
I don’t understand why Gardner didn’t get called for a foul when he ran up behind Pippen and intentionally bumped him, knocking him to the floor. It would have stopped the b.s. right there.
That is 1000% correct! He should have been called for a flagrant. But it doesn’t excuse what came next.
if gardner had a beef go to his face say wassup and then push him not from behind thats cowardly.at least gardner was prepared for pippins deserved attack.hitting a man from behind with no notice to defend himself is not cool
One thing for sure is that really is scottie pippen son, Gardner didn’t have to do all that, add to the fact trash refs looked at them went that happened, and still didn’t make the call. So it was a valid crashout.
He didn’t hit him. He pushed him and his fall seemed exaggerated. Like SM and I said, MG should have been hit with a flagrant 1.
ware over never playing edey pat got that one right.with a full squard and lots depth need to see what it looks like versus good teams.fresh ty is still fresh but how long will that last.no bam ware is unacceptable bad job pat getting big help.pelle dav wiggy should get considerations for all nba defensive team.powell showed last night his craftiness and athleticism getting to the hole.bam needs to bring it for 48 at half 4 pts 3 rebs aint gonna cut it if .ware played 35 mins he’d lead the league in rebounding.he grabs rebounds where not many men grab them at.still think needs little more gerth on him.nice to see the full squad cant wait to see them versus the cleve dets of the world.niko looks so good as a cheerleader id like to send him my personal hfl pom poms.fonzi doing a great job to rah rah fonzi keep it up.dru wants davs back get the pompoms out.to.u guys look great with pompoms.spobot what took u so long with niko btw $$$$$ a factor or step dads commands?
Also not sure Myron instigated that sequence. In the leadup to that he hit a 3 vs Pippen, defended Pippen on an airball layup, and then Pippen took him out of the air as he was going for a OREB, which is a dangerous play. That was what preceded the bump and then altercation. Regardless, Gardner and Larsson are exactly what this team needs on the wing. Pelle is another frequent target of opponents because of his style of play, it’s annoying to play against players who go 100%
As this season goes on it seems Larsson has turned into a starting caliber wing, Gardner is filling Larrson’s previous role as energy player off the bench, beautiful to watch
The team somehow plays better with him in the starting lineup.
I agree. There are several players better than him on the team, but the chemistry just happens to be great with him starting.
he has great basketball instincts shows in his cuts to basket and his lobs for slammers does everything naturally.a swedish meat baller
I m happy with how current rotation looks right now. Things are much different then I though would be at the start of the season, but starting lineup has cohesion and scoring, and the bench has some of both too with the return of Ty.
And there are still some useful players at the end of the bench.
Its not a contender team, but it can win quite a lot of games, and can make contenders sweat a bit in PO.
I fine with that this year.
Me too
Another walk in the park type game for Miami. 70 points in the paint again. Bam looked like Shaq vs MEM frontcourt. Pelle again a team high 35 min and everyone else was again <30. (Compare to Philly who is playing Maxey and VJ 38 and 35 min every night)
Bam with another insanely high net rating tonight – 48.4 (was 49 vs ATL). Heat’s offensive rating when Bam was on the floor tonight – 156.9 (!!)
Brevin Knight (MEM broadcast) said the difference with this Heat team vs previous is the number of offensive creators the team has. Miami was blowing by MEM all night on perimeter. Really impressed with Pelle’s first step and decisiveness going downhill. And what Jakucionas is doing at PG as a 19 yr old is special