The Heat win the NBA play-in tournament and qualify for the NBA playoffs. After a season of turmoil, the team beat the Atlanta Hawks last night in overtime. They will face the Cleveland Cavaliers in the first round. The Heat are the first 10th seed to win the play-in tournament.
In the 1986 movie, “Heartbreak Ridge,” Clint Eastwood plays Gunnery Sergeant Thomas Highway. He doesn’t balance civilian life and war well. In one scene, his protege gets thrown in a jail cell while he’s looking for him. He realizes he’s in the same cell when he hears Eastwood, “you can run me, you can stab me, you could beat me, you could kill me–just don’t bore me.”
The Heat are an organization that needs to be competing. Pat Riley, Mickey Arison and others in the front office haven’t bred the culture to be content to go into the off-season, prepare for the draft, etc, etc. They need to win or lose on the court.
Heat jumped on Hawks early
The Heat scored 33 points in the first quarter sparked by Andrew Wiggins nine points. Kel’el Ware came to play with eight and Bam Adebayo also scored eight. Then Tyler Herro woke up and scored ten points in the second quarter. Georges Niang and Caris Levert came off the bench for the Hawks in the second and tied the scoring at 29 in the quarter with the Heat.
Heat offense didn’t collapse, but slowed
In the second half, the Heat’s offensive production slowed. Atlanta made a furious comeback with a 29-point fourth quarter. Atlanta was up by as much as six at the six-minute mark of the quarter because of a 20-7 run by the Hawks. Then Davion Mitchell hit a three-pointer, and Tyler Herro hit two clutch jumpers to put the Heat up by 1.
Tyler Herro went to the line with the Heat up 105-104 and missed the second foul shot. Trae Young was able to get around Andrew Wiggins to tie the score at 106 and go into OT. Just as it seemed that the Heat would run out of gas and collapse, Tyler Herro hit a three and Davion Mitchell hit back-to-back threes at the start of OT.
Atlanta made another run to close to 114-117, but Herro and Mitchell hit three-point shots to pull away finally. The Heat outrebounded the Hawks and outshared them. The Hawks were one of the top teams in the league in assists this season.
Heat vs. Cavaliers first-round preview
The Heat lost the season series to Cleveland, two games to one. In December, the Heat ran the Cavs out of the Kaseya Center. Then, the Cavs did the same to Miami in January. In March, the Heat went up to Cleveland and pushed the Cavs to the limit. Duncan Robinson hit a tying three-pointer that was waived off late in the game.
Cavs head coach Kenny Atkinson said that the Heat would be tough to play in the first round. I’m sure he and his staff have been prepping for Miami for a couple of weeks. They play Sunday in Cleveland.
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