Historic overtime dominance has been a key to the Miami Heat’s success
By Duncan Smith
The Miami Heat have an outstanding 30-13 record so far and their success in close games in general and overtime specifically has been key.
The Miami Heat are off to a great start to the season with a surprising 30-13 record. More than halfway through the season they sit alone in second place in the Eastern Conference with a one-game lead over the Toronto Raptors.
The biggest key to their outstanding record so far has been their clutch play. Their play in close games in general and overtime, in particular, has put them in this position.
In the 19 games they’ve played which qualify as clutch (a margin of five points or less with five minutes or less to go), the Heat are 13-6. The best team has a big edge in clutch games because they’re more likely to be able to execute under pressure, but a winning percentage of 68.4 percent is outrageous.
Their overtime performances have been even more remarkable. They’re 7-0 in overtime this season which is verging upon historic. They’re only two wins behind the NBA record for overtime victories in a season, set by the Sacramento Kings in 2000-01 with a 9-4 record.
No team has played more than eight overtime games without a loss in NBA history. The previous best winning percentage belongs to the 1977-78 Milwaukee Bucks, who went 8-1 with an 88.9 winning percentage.
The difference between wins and losses in these close games is stark. If the Heat had found a way to lose all seven overtime games (or lost them in regulation and had a perfectly reasonable 13-13 clutch record), their record would drop from their outstanding 30-13 mark to a pedestrian 23-20.
It’s still good, but it wouldn’t have them in the upper echelons of the Eastern Conference. Instead, they would likely be battling for a six or seven seed in the playoff race.
The luck that it takes to win close games can be fickle. Fortunately, the Miami Heat have played a well below-average number of clutch games which bodes well for their ability to continue to pick up wins.
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With a non-clutch record of 17-7, the Heat are showing they can handle teams before winning time kicks in. They must keep putting opponents away before the randomness of late-game luck in close games flips the script on them. But in the meantime, their historic overtime pace persists.