The Miami Heat are 19-19, sitting with an uneasy attitude as the 6th seed in the Eastern Conference, as they go home to play the Denver Nuggets in South Florida after a perplexing 24 point loss to the Atlanta Hawks on Sunday.
The Miami Heat are 7-3 in their past 10 games and should be pretty stoked to play the no. 1 seeded Denver Nuggets from the Western Conference, if it wasn’t for how much the Atlanta Hawks own the Heat this season.
Miami has lost to Atlanta 3 times this year, most recently losing 106-82 to the Hawks. The Heat shot 35.6 percent from the field (31-87), 14.7 percent from downtown (5-34), and 55.6 percent from the charity stripe (15-27). It was one of the worst shooting performances in Miami Heat history, and it wasn’t because the Hawks were playing great defense, the Heat were straight up missing uncontested shots all over the floor.
Not to mention, Atlanta was making everything, astonishingly outscoring the Heat 68-45 going into half time.
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To give more of an in-depth look at how the team was feeling, Anthony Chiang of the Miami herald quoted Erik Spoelstra and Dwyane Wade on what their thoughts were after the loss:
"“It’s doing things with a purpose, a sense of urgency, focus, details,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said when asked about the Heat’s offensive woes against the Hawks. “Things we’ve been doing very well. This was not our best game. They had a lot to say with it. They played well, and we paid the price for it.” “You’re only going to hold a team down for so long,” Miami guard Dwyane Wade said. “So they started making shots and then it seemed like our fight just went away a little bit from that point on. So once they got up, we couldn’t come back. We weren’t making enough shots. And defensively, we just weren’t there.”"
The glaring sound bites to get from Spo and Wade were, “doing things with a purpose, a sense of urgency, focus, details,” as well as, “we just weren’t there.”
These quotes always seem to be the case after a thrashing loss, such as this one. It seems this Miami Heat team just needs to look in the mirror and re-think how they go into their next game; the Heat are known for their grit and intensity, and if they lose that culture for one single game, then they will most likely not come away with the win.
Moreover, if your team is built on resiliency and a daily grind mentality, It will probably be pretty important to bring that attitude when playing the best team in the Western Conference.
The Denver Nuggets are the no. 1 seed in the West, sitting at a record of 26-12, patiently waiting for their moment to upset the Golden State Warriors this postseason (might have to wait awhile). The Nuggs were on a 5 game winning streak, until last night, when James Harden and the Houston Rockets defeated Denver 125-113.
As for the second game of the Nuggs back-to-back, they play the Heat, and these lineups below will most likely be the starters going into tonight’s game.
Miami Heat Projected Starting Lineup:
- PG, Justise Winslow
- SG, Josh Richardson
- SF, Rodney McGruder
- PF, James Johnson
- C, Hassan Whiteside
Injury report: PG, Goran Dragic will be OUT
Denver Nuggets Projected Starting Lineup:
- PG, Jamal Murray
- SG, Gary Harris
- SF, Torrey Craig
- PF, Paul Millsap
- C, Nikola Jokic
Injury report: SG, Will Barton OUT; PG, Isaiah Thomas OUT; SF, Michael Porter Jr. OUT; PF, Jarred Vanderbilt OUT
Because of teams feeling out their rosters and finally getting to the halfway point of the season, this will be one of Miami’s real first tests against the Nuggets. In order to beat Denver, there will be 3 blazing hot factors to watch out for going into this game, with the first having to do with a certain Serbian Joker.