The Miami Heat suffer their seventh straight loss as they fall to the Phoenix Suns inside the Kaseya Center, 118-105. The last time they had this many consecutive losses was in the late portion of the 2007-2008 season where the team only had 15 wins the whole year.
Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra was blunt with the media after the ugly outing and said that the “level of urgency” and concern is “extremely high.” He would go on to say that one way or another, the team has to overcome the the hurdles that are in front of them and puts accountability on himself for Miami.
“I mean, obviously if you're in this kind of hole right now, the level of urgency, concern is extremely high. We're just not doing it consistently hard enough, tough enough, with enough resolve with the things that come at you in an NBA game. We can do it for for periods of time, but not be able to sustain it,” Spoelstra said. “We have to get over this hurdle, one way or another, and that's what we're gonna get to work on. And we've been saying that, we've been doing it and I'm not absolving myself from this at all. I'm every bit a part of this right now and we have to come together and figure out some solutions and dig deep to figure out how to get one win. That's what this thing is about right now.”
Spoelstra says team is experiencing “karma” from lack of toughness
Once again, the Heat had a rough shooting night, a trend that has been happening for a few weeks and even times before the seven-game winning streak started. However, the bad shooting leads to vulnerable defense on the other side which Spoelstra mentions that the team is suffering “karma” with the lack of effort.
“You can can feel palpable discouragement when we miss shots that we think are make-able. And then it compounds into our lack of committed toughness and effort on the other end you have to do tough things defensively. Once we got down by 25 plus, our energy level, effort level, multiple effort levels skyrocketed, and then that's the karma of the game and that took a little bit of pressure off our offense and and then all of a sudden the shot starts to go down and which comes first, the chicken or the egg,” Spoelstra said. “We feel that your commitment to doing those tough things, the multiple efforts, scrambling, getting that tough block out or taking a charge. I don't remember the last time we've taken a charge. And again, you have to do physical things. You have to do tough things your body. You have to go back to the body and we're not doing that consistently enough. And while we're going through this period of time offensively, we're not able to overcome that.”
Star Jimmy Butler once again led the team, this time with 26 points as at a lot of points throughout the game, it seemed as if him and newcomer Terry Rozier (21 points) were the only players executing efficiently on offense. As a whole, the Heat shot 39.3 percent from the field and 38.9 percent from three-point range.
Butler isn't concerned after Heat losing seven straight
Butler mentioned after the game that the defense has been uncharacteristic which has to be fixed with saying that the shots will eventually fall. However, even with losing seven straight, the 33-year old star isn't concerned.
“I'm not concerned. I still know what we're capable of. I really do. We just got to go out there and stick together through the good, through the bad, through the indifferent,” Butler said. “I know what these group of guys want out of this game and its a championship and they want to win. We got to get back to smiling, having fun, competing.”
Whether there needs to be a mentality change or not, Butler is confident that success will follow if they play to their strengths. He said to ClutchPoints that if they want to get the results they want, they have to execute on both sides of the ball.
“We're alright. We just got to stay the course and correct. But we know what we have to correct, control what we can control, and then we'll live with the results,” Butler said. “But we have to do what we have to do on both sides of the ball to get the results we want.”
The Heat are now 24-23 as they inch closer to their record being at .500 after losing seven straight. Their next opportunity in hopes to snap the skid is Wednesday night against the Sacramento Kings.
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