Miami Heat: Heat drop a tough one for their first loss of the season

The Miami Heat came into Sunday’s game riding high off of a comeback win against the Milwaukee Bucks. Could they muster up enough to get it done again?

The Miami Heat came into Sunday’s game against the Minnesota Timberwolves fresh off of and riding high off of their outrageous comeback win against an Eastern Conference contender in the Milwaukee Bucks. For more than a few reasons, Sunday’s game was bound to be a tough one.

The Miami Heat would still be without quite a few of their players in Dion Waiters, Jimmy Butler, James Johnson, and most recently Derrick Jones Jr. after he suffered an injury in Saturday’s contest against the Bucks. Speaking of the Bucks, Sunday would have them playing on the second night of a back to back set, with the first set against the Bucks having been of the deep comeback and overtime variety.

Lastly, the Minnesota Timberwolves also came into this game boasting a 2-0 record, which means that they are probably a pretty good team. These things all proved to show themselves at some point in the evening.

The Timberwolves got out on top early, closing the first quarter with a 13 point lead of 36-23. It remained much of the same, hovering around an 11 point lead or so until the Miami Heat started to make a move at around 4:50 in the second quarter.

The Heat mounted what would eventually become an 18-4 run. The Heat made this run in part due to hitting five of their nine made first-half three-point shots in the second quarter. This led to the Miami Heat closing the half leading by a score of 57-55.

The third quarter was all Miami Heat, with the Heat jumping out to by as many as 10. With the score at 84-74 in favor of the Heat, Karl-Anthony Towns hit a big three-point shot for the Timberwolves to close the quarter only down 7.

The fourth quarter opened with a battle that mostly saw the Heat maintain, eventually nesting on a four-point lead for quite a bit. Things all started to change at around 5:52 in the fourth though. Andrew Wiggins hit a three-pointer that tied the game at 96-96, and as they say, that was all she wrote.

The game went back and forth for a minute, mostly between various Heat members and Andrew Wiggins, until it was just Andrew Wiggins. Including the three he hit at 93-96 to tie the ballgame at 96 all, he scored 16 of the Timberwolves’ next 17 points to give them what would become an insurmountable lead of 110-101, with 1:45 left in the game.

The Heat continued to fight, but the lead proved to be too much. Minnesota won the game with a final score of 116-109. Minnesota is now 3-0 and the Miami Heat drop to 2-1, losing both their first game and first road game of the season.

Kendrick Nunn continued to shine, leading the team in scoring with 25. He added in four rebounds and two assists as well. Justise Winslow had 20 points, eight rebounds, and six assists.

Bam Adebayo had 13 points, nine rebounds, and five dimes. Duncan Robinson had a game, with 21 points, two rebounds and an assist. The Dragon Goran Dragic continued to be aggressive off the bench with 13 points, five rebounds, and four assists.

The Heat could have used all of their members in this one, and especially the leadership and scoring of Jimmy Butler, whom we know they should at least have back by their next game. They will be right back at it on Tuesday in their first of what can only be called a true double-double, two national television games and both against the Atlanta Hawks.