The Miami Heat would need a goliath of a performance on one end of the floor or the other in order to get a win in Orlando on Friday. Could they somehow do it?
The Miami Heat have been on a rather decent tear through the Eastern Conference as of late. They’ve knocked off the Philadelphia 76ers twice within about a three week span, they beat the Indiana Pacers last week, while they also handled the Toronto Raptors on Thursday night for the second time this season and the first time in American Airlines Arena.
The first time that the Miami Heat beat the Raptors, it was in Scotiabank Arena and was also the first time that the Raptors had been defeated there all season. It was almost turning out to be a perfect sequence of events until we realized that the Miami Heat’s next Eastern Conference test would come on the second night of a back to back set.
To make this situation just that much grimmer, it would be against an in-state rival in the Orlando Magic, who always give the Heat all that they can handle. The game went exactly as you may have thought it would have on the second night of a back to back. The Orlando Magic came out firing and also playing suffocating defense, while the Miami Heat couldn’t hit shots or stop fouling.
This was ultimately the recipe to a 20 point win in favor of the Magic, 105-85. The referees didn’t help at all either, having a hairpin trigger like whistle on one end, while the Miami Heat had to be nearly criminally assaulted to get fouls at times on the other.
Terrence Ross went all crazy on Friday as well. At one point he was 5-6 from three-point land, en route to a 7-13 from the field and 6-10 from three performance that would ultimately see him lead his team in scoring for the game with 25 points off the pine.
The Miami Heat haven’t played well on the second night of back to backs all year and they must at least try to break even in those types of situations from here out, as they are probably at least three sets below .500 in the area at this point. They are off until Sunday, where they will welcome the Miami Heat’s former number 21 and his Portland Trail Blazers into American Airlines Arena.