As the postseason gets nearer and nearer for the Miami Heat with two games left, they are facing a litany of hurdles that are mandatory to overcome if they want to recreate the magic from last season and go back to the NBA Finals. Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra gave his thoughts on opposing teams succeeding against them in packing the paint leading to disappointing performances as of late.
The loss to the Dallas Mavericks was a prime example of a team in scouting the Heat's strengths and putting a stop to it leading them to controlling the game throughout four quarters. As Miami's main stars in Jimmy Butler and especially Bam Adebayo get most of their production in the restricted area, the Mavericks held them to just 20 points collectively while both combined to shoot four of 11 in the paint.
Spoelstra on what it will take to overcome teams packing the paint
What resulted was Miami trying to jump over the barrier and adapt to what Dallas was throwing at them, but with the Heat struggling early and Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving shooting lights out, the game was decided before it even ended. Spoelstra said after the game that to overcome defenses packing the paint, his team needs to be “connected” and with every play, “there has to be intention.”
“It takes everybody connected, working together to be able to do that,” Spoelstra said. “They’re not as easy of reads as they were at the beginning of the year and you can’t expect them to be. But there has to be intention. Every single possession, there has to be intention, there has to be a motor, there has to be things done with pace and detail and then moving the ball.”
“It’s gotten a little sticky of late,” Spoelstra continued. “Where I think the competitive nature of our group, guys really want to will it and we’re holding it a little bit longer than what is appropriate for our team and we’re missing some moments. But we’re going to fix that. We’ll get this right.”
Erik Spoelstra on Dallas packing in the paint and how it impacted Bam Adebayo’s rough performance tonight.
“We still need to find a way to get him [Adebayo] to his strength zones…” #HeatCulture pic.twitter.com/mMHds0jDoR
— Zachary Weinberger (@ZachWeinberger) April 11, 2024
Adebayo on Miami's identity inside the restricted area
Adebayo himself finished the game with just eight points and three rebounds where he started the game only making one out of nine attempts from the field in the first half. It was arguably one of the star's worst outings of the season and admitted in the locker room to the media that they have “got to be better” in the restricted area since that is a part of “who we are.”
“That's who we are,” Adebayo said about Miami's goal to thrive in the paint. “We try to get in the paint and be aggressive, and make plays from there. For us, we just got to be better, watch film, go over it, and try to figure it out.”
Now that there is two games left, the Heat are no longer in control of their own destiny as their goal was to win out but have dropped some key games with one being the aforementioned outing against Dallas. While it is still possible to obtain a top-six seed still, it's virtually improbable and have to rely on other variables, but Adebayo said that the team will be getting “some South Beach sun” so they can “recuperate.”
“Go out, get some South Beach sun, get your mind off it and recuperate,” Adebayo said. “Wouldn't say reality sets in cause we take it a game at a time, you never know what could happen, biggest thing for us is to get these last two.”
Bam Adebayo on if the team is preparing themselves for the play-in.
“Wouldn’t say reality sets in cause we take it a game at a time…” #HeatCulture pic.twitter.com/1MBKPbDVlu
— Zachary Weinberger (@ZachWeinberger) April 11, 2024
Butler's recent struggles in the paint
Packing the paint impacts Adebayo, but possibly more so for Butler since he embraces his play-style in driving to the area and getting tough buckets. However, that metic has been down in the past five games as he has “shot just 12 of 27 (44.4 percent) from within the restricted area and had five of those 27 shots (18.5 percent) blocked” according to Anthony Chiang of The Miami Herald.
“We all understand how important it is to get Jimmy [Butler] going. Our team understands it, Jimmy understands it, head coach understands it,” Spoelstra said. “Some nights like this you're just going to have to figure out a way to get it done and he'll muster up what he needs to do down the stretch, but we can never get it to that point.”
Tyler Herro provides explanation for Heat struggling to overcome
The Heat's third star in Tyler Herro has been a huge boost to the team on the offensive side of the ball since coming back from a 20-game absence where he had a nagging foot issue. After the Dallas game, Herro said that because of Miami's continuous injury problem, the team has had to overcome opposing game plans.
“It's hard to say because from game to game, teams are taking away different things. Ultimately, we had to figure out a way that we can try to play somewhat the same identity on the offensive end game to game,” Herro said. “I feel like right now it's kind of just been changing game the game and it doesn't help that we don't have all of our guys, I'm obviously a big part of that. I was out for two months almost. It's not easy for us and definitely isn't easy on our coaching staff because half the time they don't even know who's playing. We just hope to get healthy and with the guys that we have, we can continue to figure this out. We're gonna set ourselves up to probably be in the play-in and we've been there before and we'll figure it out.”
Miami is 44-36 which puts them eighth in the tightly packed Eastern Conference where they have two games left both against the Toronto Raptors at home. Their post-season path could be decided Friday night as if they lose or the Orlando Magic beat the Philadelphia 76ers, they will be locked for a spot in the play-in tourney.
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