Observations and different notes of curiosity from Saturday night time’s 112-109 victory over the Toronto Raptors:
– This wasn’t about any singular star for Erik Spoelstra’s staff.
– Which is strictly what Erik Spoelstra’s staff must be about.
– Because working the offense for Tyler Herro’s isolation sport did the offense no favors the primary two video games.
– Nor did the dearth of ball motion.
– Last season, the nice unknown of who could be the Heat’s greatest participant on any given night time is what pushed them to the highest of the Eastern Conference.
– This was a sport that felt like that once more.
– It was one thing from so many.
– From Kyle Lowry discovering his vary.
– To Jimmy Butler and Caleb Martin attacking.
– To Max Strus including a wanted increase off the bench.
– And to Herro nonetheless scoring.
– Who is aware of, possibly the protection will flip equally cohesive.
– And the Heat will be capable of shut one thing like this out with far much less drama.
– Whew.
– This time the Heat didn’t drive the problem on offense.
– It flowed.
– Yes, the Raptors needed to journey in a single day from Brooklyn.
– So count on extra of a combat in Monday night time’s rematch.
– When Fred VanVleet gained’t stand scoreless with 4 fouls at halftime, and 5 inside the first 20 seconds of the second half.
– For now, you are taking the wanted W and transfer on.
– The opening two losses didn’t shake Spoelstra from the beginning lineup of Bam Adebayo, Martin, Butler, Herro and Lowry.
– The Raptors countered with a primary 5 of VanVleet, Gary Trent Jr., O.G. Anunoby, Scottie Barnes and Pascal Siakam.
– This time Adebayo’s first foul got here 1:17 in, after a foul-filled night time Friday.
– During that very same break, Gabe Vincent needed to enter after Lowry required therapy for a facial laceration.
– Vincent instantly drained a 3-point on his first try.
– And adopted with an help on a Herro 3-pointer.
– He then was subbed again out in favor of Lowry with 8:57 left within the first.
– With Lowry changing a 3-pointer on his subsequent try.
– Dewayne Dedmon then adopted because the Heat’s first true substitute.
– With Strus following after which Duncan Robinson making it 4 deep off the bench.
– Butler’s seventh basket moved him previous P.J. Brown for twenty first on the Heat all-time record.
– Strus’ 14th level was the 1,000th of his profession.
– In some ways the Raptors mirror the Heat’s switch-everything defensive precepts.
– “The schematics are not as unusual as they used to be,” Spoelstra mentioned of the defensive method. “There’s a lot of teams that switch, at least one through four. However, their personnel is much different and the way they play is much different than most teams.”:
– Spoelstra mentioned the method of Raptors coach Nick Nurse may be uniquely distinctive.
– “I’ve seen some of their lineups where they’re playing four fours, three fives, however you want to classify it,” Spoelstra mentioned, “There are a lot of different lineups they’ll have and different ways of doing things. But the most important thing is the force that they play with, in transition, attacking in isos and open court, one on one. And then they’re one of the very best offensive-rebounding teams in the league.”
– Spoelstra added, “Defensively, regardless of how they do it, whatever the scheme is, they’re really disruptive. They can force a lot of turnovers, get a lot of deflections.”
– Spoelstra supplied a pregame vote of confidence when requested by a member of the Toronto media about Lowry.
– “He looks great,” Spoelstra mentioned. “And it’s a credit to the work that he put in this summer. It was a real offseason, not only for him, but for all of our guys, that we haven’t had for a couple of years. So he was able to put in the work. He had a really good training camp and we’ll build from here.”
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