The Miami Heat travel to the state of New York to face the Brooklyn Nets on Friday night. What does NBA 2K20 have to say about the matchup?
In our ongoing NBA 2K20 game-day preview series, we turn to Friday night’s game between the Miami Heat and the Brooklyn Nets. The Heat bring their 27-10 record on the road to face the 16-20 Nets.
We’ve been predicting game outcomes for the Heat using NBA 2K20 for almost a month, and to this point we’ve only gotten three games incorrect. Once again we’ll look to the advanced predictive powers of NBA 2K to get an idea of what to expect in this game between the Heat and Nets.
First, the ground rules. We modified the Nets’ lineup to reflect their rotation and minutes from their last game, a 111-103 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder on Tuesday. As for the Heat, we’ll mirror the slow re-integration Justise Winslow is taking and limit his minutes to 16. We’ll follow the Heat minutes and rotation as closely as possible relative to their past few games.
In order to reflect the Heat’s defensive tendencies, we moved up head coach Erik Spoelstra’s run zone tendency from five percent to 50 percent. We also changed Bam Adebayo’s secondary position to power forward since Meyers Leonard’s positions look that way. Lastly,we edited Tyler Herro, Jimmy Butler, and Adebayo’s vitals to allow them to initiate the offense.
Starting lineups
Miami Heat
Point guard, Kendrick Nunn
Shooting guard, Duncan Robinson
Small forward, Jimmy Butler
Power forward, Bam Adebayo
Center, Meyers Leonard
Brooklyn Nets
Point guard, Spencer Dinwiddie
Shooting guard, Joe Harris
Small forward, Rodions Kurucs
Power forward, Taurean Prince
Center, Jarrett Allen
Outcome
Nets 119, Heat 100
For the second straight game, NBA 2K20 predicts a Heat loss by a wide margin. The last time, against the Indiana Pacers, 2K20 was wrong. Hopefully for Heat fans in a blowout loss to the simulated Brooklyn Nets, it will be wrong again.
The Nets got off to a hot start, winning the first quarter 34-26. The Heat chipped away here and there throughout the game, but the Nets outscored them 31-21 in the final stanza to put it away for good.
Both teams shot well from 3-point range, with the Nets going 13-of-29 (45 percent) and the Heat going 11-of 26 (42 percent), but the Heat only shot 27-of-63 (43 percent again) from 2-point range against the Nets’ 33-of-62 (53 percent).
Player stats
Miami Heat
Kendrick Nunn – 10 points, 2 rebounds, 3 assists
Duncan Robinson – 10 points, 2 rebounds
Jimmy Butler – 15 points, 5 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 steals, 1 block
Bam Adebayo – 12 points, 12 rebounds, 3 assists, 2 steals, 1 block
Meyers Leonard – 13 points, 10 rebounds, 3 assists, 1 steal, 1 block
Justise Winslow – 3 points, 4 rebounds, 2 assists
Goran Dragic – 17 points, 2 assists
Tyler Herro – 17 points, 2 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 steal
Brooklyn Nets
Spencer Dinwiddie – 17 points, 4 rebounds, 5 assists, 1 steal
Joe Harris – 19 points, 1 rebound, 1 assist
Rodions Kurucs – 9 points, 7 rebounds, 1 assist, 2 steals
Taurean Prince – 20 points, 7 rebounds, 1 assist
Jarrett Allen – 14 points, 9 rebounds, 1 assist, 5 blocks
Caris LaVert – 22 points, 3 rebounds, 6 assists
Make sure to check back Sunday morning for our next projections between the Miami Heat and the New York Knicks.