The Miami Heat’s win over the Wizards was much tougher than it should have been. Coach Spo had to do something that he should never want to do again.
The Miami Heat just recently got a win over one of their divisional rivals in the Washington Wizards, although divisions don’t quite mean anything much in today’s NBA. Seeing the Wizards on numerous occasions every year has bred quite the rivalry and fire behind their matchups during the regular season.
What has often made these matchups extra special to watch are the close games that have been played between the two teams over the past few seasons, no matter who was on the floor for each club. This season, however, has seen things remain the same, for the most part.
The Miami Heat won their first matchup of the season by nine points, a game played in Miami and to a tune of 112-103. The Wizards won the second matchup of the year, that was played in their home arena and via a whopping margin and in glorious fashion, 125-103.
Wednesday’s matchup saw the Miami Heat emerge victoriously, but that game most certainly had its hiccups. The Miami Heat were up as much as 20 points as the third quarter began, and then it started to happen. The starting unit for the Miami Heat then proceeded to allow the Washingon Wizards to plow down a 20 point lead into practically a tie ball game.
This caused coach Erik Spoelstra to do something we have rarely if ever seen him do. He executed the mass substitution, taking out his entire first unit to replace them with the second unit guys.
They proceeded to stretch the lead back out while the first unit guys got their heads back in the game, which eventually led to a Heat win. Here is what Coach Spo had to say on that matter when asked about it by Ira Winderman of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.
Spoelstra on full unit substitution, “That whole unit was responsible.” And, “If I’m doing that regularly, I’m in trouble.”
— Ira Winderman (@IraHeatBeat) January 23, 2020
The response given by coach Spo is exactly spot on and it’s great to hear he knows it. If he finds himself in a position where he has to do that ever again, nevermind with just a bit of regularity, then something needs to change with the way the units are deployed. The Miami Heat can’t have issues like that if they hope to max out on what this team can potentially do as far as being a contending team this season.
That’s why this is something that Spo should never want to do again, because if he has to, then he has a huge task ahead of him. That would mean tinkering enough to have an impact, but not too much so that you mess with what this team has going on at the moment.
You have to attribute some of it to Jimmy Butler not quite finding the consistency in his shooting stroke yet, but you also have to lay some of it at the feet of defensive lapses on that end of the floor by the Heat. Either way, I believe Spo will address and account for it moving forward, as we just can’t have that and still get the best version of the Miami Heat as they can possibly give throughout the remainder of this regular and postseason.