Depending on who you are, this 2024-25 Miami Heat season felt like three seasons piled into one. That was sure the case for me. Erik Spoelstra’s timeout debacle against the Detroit Pistons felt like it happened three years ago and yet it hasn’t even been five months. All of the non-stop Jimmy Butler drama and blown leads have taken years off some of our lives, but I digress.
There is exactly one week left in the regular season. Here is where the Miami Heat rest amongst the league in a few key statistics:
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- The Miami Heat enters the final week of the regular season eight games below .500 (35-43). That is their worst 78-game start since 2014-15, when it was also 35-43 entering the final four contests.
That’s not a fun stat to begin with, but the reality is this team has been below .500 just three other times since 2007-08: In 2014-15, 2016-17 and 2018-19, the year before it landed Jimmy Butler. Accept reality!
- The Heat clinched their play-in berth on Thursday. According to Basketball Reference, the Miami Heat entered Sunday with a 53.1 percent chance at earning the No. 10 seed in the East.
After their 121-115 overtime loss Saturday, Miami was a 0.5 game back of the Chicago Bulls for the No. 9 seed and 1.5 games back of the Atlanta Hawks for the No. 8 seed. According to BR’s probabilities chart, they have a 27.8 percent chance at the No. 9 seed and 16.5 percent chance at the No. 8 seed before next week’s play-in tournament.
- If Heat earn No. 10 seed, they will look to become third No. 10 to ever win a play-in game since 7-10 format was fully implemented in 2020-21.
No team that has finished No. 10 in the regular season standings have made the postseason in the play-in format. No. 10 seeds are 2-6 in their first play-in game, with the only victories being Chicago and Oklahoma City in 2022-23. The Bulls lost to the Heat 102-91 in their second play-in game while the Thunder lost 120-95 to the Minnesota Timberwolves.
- Heat are on track to finish with a bottom-third offense for a third-straight season.
Despite a team-wide shift in shot diet, Miami is currently No. 21 in offense entering the final week, scoring 111.9 points per 100 possessions. They are 1.1 points per 100 possessions behind the Atlanta Hawks (20th) and 0.6 points ahead of the Portland Trail Blazers (22nd). They scored 113.3 and 112.3 points per 100 in each of the last two seasons, respectively.
- Heat are on track to finish as one of the league’s best defensive rebounding teams for fifth time in six years.
No rebounds, no rings. Miami was the third-best defensive rebounding team in the NBA a year ago and they are on track to be the sixth-best this year, corralling 73.4 percent of their misses. The only teams that are better are the Los Angeles Clippers, Sacramento Kings, Orlando Magic, Chicago Bulls and Milwaukee Bucks.
- A year after being the NBA’s fourth-worst 3-point shooting team, they are No. 13 in 3-point percentage at 36.6 percent.
Ironically enough, the Heat’s 3-point percentage this year was 0.4 percentage points worse than it was last year, when it finished No. 27. They are also No. 12 in 3-point attempts per 100 possessions after being 14th in that category a season ago.
- Heat are slated to finish outside the top-10 in defense for first time since 2014-15, according to Cleaning The Glass.
That’s a remarkable stat. Miami is currently 11th in defense, 0.1 point behind the Memphis Grizzlies, who’s 10th.
- Miami has the easiest remaining strength of schedule by far in final week.
Three of the Heat’s final four opponents–Washington Wizards, Philadelphia 76ers and New Orleans Pelicans–are tanking. The other? The Chicago Bulls, who are playing solid basketball of late despite being six games below. 500.
- Remember how bad they were against good teams last year? They weren’t much better this year, going 6-18, despite having the 16th-best NET Rating against teams top-10 in point differential.
Who were their six wins, you ask? Golden State (twice), Cleveland (once), Houston (once), Boston (once) and Minnesota (once). Take that!
- Let’s end on a more positive note. IF the Heat go 3-1 over this final week, it will mark the second time since 2012-13 that they close the regular season on a 9-3 stretch over their final 12 games.
The only other season when they went 9-3 over their final 12 was in 2020-21, which ended in a miserable four-game sweep to the Milwaukee Bucks. Miami closed last year’s regular season 8-4 over their final 12.
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After tonight’s games (the Hawks beat the Jazz and the Bulls beat the Hornets), following are the Eastern Conference #7 – #10 play-in standings with 4 games to go:
#7 Orlando: 38-40 (games remaining vs Hawks, vs Celtics, @ Pacers, @ Hawks)
#8 Atlanta: 37-41 (games remaining @ Magic, @ Nets, @76ers, vs Magic)
#9 Chicago: 36-42 (games remaining @ Cavaliers, vs Heat, vs Wizards, @ 76ers)
#10 Miami: 35-43 (games remaining vs 76ers, @ Bulls, @ Pelicans, vs Wizards)
Based on remaining schedules, the Heat will likely end up in 9th or 10th place. They would need to win two games to get to the first round of the playoffs to face first place Cleveland.
Indeed 10th place seems like the most likely result. Which is fine by me. If we make it out of the play in round by eliminating 2 teams, I believe we can have a close series with Cavs and it is worth it. But I don’t think we will make it out of the play in.
I admire your optimism, but I don’t see it. The team is 6-12 in their last 18 games. If they win out, they still won’t be a 500 team. They are playing their best ball of the season, and Wiggins is on the verge of returning, but I don’t see any deep run happening. Some (not you) discount the importance to the future of the team getting the lottery pick. I don’t. They have a chance to pick up a solid point guard and decent backup center. Make a trade for an A or A+ player, and anything is possible for years to come.
Stats-wise Heat are the underdogs of the play-in. But we all know the talking heads, analysts, pdeudo-experts hehe…knows better in betting against the Heat. Happened a lot of times already though we know Mr. Diva-playoff-Jimmy is not here anymore its the Heat culture that everyone is wary of. If there’s one team that can pull of a miracle, its this Miami Heat 😜💪🏻🏀
If not, there’s always next year.
From a 2023 SI story:
It’s a truly tragic situation for Wiggins, and even worse when people were making up rumors about infidelity in his life. As much as Golden State Warriors fans wanted to see him back on the court while the team was struggling, you only get one father. The amount of regret Wiggins would have for not being with his father during that time of need would be far more overwhelming than anything else. Even if he were to play on the court, Wiggins just wouldn’t be there mentally, because he would be thinking about his father. The best thing possible is what the Golden State Warriors have been doing, give Andrew Wiggins space and support until he’s ready to return.
With this news finally revealed, hopefully, fans who were “demanding” that Wiggins reveal why he’s absent, can finally be put to rest. Be a human being first, before being a sports fan.
I agree. We should shut our mouths (or comments) before we know the true and full story. Learned it several years ago. And learned it the hard way. Had to close my socmed accts temporarily for a few months. These players are sons, fathers, brothers, uncles…first before they are players for our fave team.
Story from 2024/2025. Andrew Wiggins played 43 games from the warriors and 15 for the heat from a whopping 58 games lmao. What’s the reason now?
Maybe when he put on jersey #22 he caught Jimmy Butler syndrome. It could happen.
There are three kinds of lies, Damn Lies, White Lies and Statistics. The only statistic that ultimately means anything is wins and losses. This isn’t Miami’s year. Que sera, sera. There’s always next year.
The Heat has to change it’s trajectory or all the younger teams will soon pass Miami by. It is time to begin a serious retooling/rebuilding process the day after the team’s postseason ends.
easier said than done retooling rebuilding u do that u can be bad for 10 years.id rather stay like this just add on get a fn ss not to far off just a ss away.u add kd to current roster theres a chance i could meet rc and 30 in july and ill take a plane to sd to ck one cool looking dude.
Just like there was a chance the Nets and the Suns would win rings with KD. His time has come and gone. We just got rid of an old man, we don’t need to bring in another one.
Two draft picks (either both this year or one this year and one next), a bunch of expiring contracts and a bunch of cap space by the summer of 2026 to bring in free agents to go with our young core works for me. Now is not the time to be impatient. It’s the time to keep developing our young players and add one or more difference makers to the team by the end of next season.
developing pelle jjj shnozic or even the g leaguers will get u aplayin game so fast.ty has developed very nicely still a flawed player.bam has developed nicely still a flawed player.no flawed players get jewelry.we saw what a ss looks like the other night.how do we get one.d wade got us lebron bosh prob had an influence on marquette butler.until we get one of those or jjj pelle shnoz become the next larry bird we are not sniffing jewelry.how and who do we get sunman lets be a little specific here.who are some unrestricted fas coming up.there are 30 other teams that will be vying for their services.as long as we are competitive and eric reid is doing the games im good. the dolphins need to give me a ring its been 1/2 century for those bums .the heat have been great to me ty pat and mickey.please mr ross sell the fins