The Miami Heat face the Lakers in Game 5 of the NBA Finals on Friday. With the Lakers’ decision on their jerseys for the game, they are sending a message.
The Miami Heat are in a hole. That isn’t proverbial, that isn’t figurative, this is a literal hole that they have dug for themselves in the 2020 NBA Finals.
Luckily for them, they have some of the hardest workers in sports on their roster. They also have a coach and those above him that are some of the toughest and used to dealing with any kind of adversity.
They must overcome a few things in order to potentially get back in this series though. The first thing that they must overcome is themselves.
When you are in a scenario like this, one tends to let their mind get the best of them. If they can stay focused on the task at hand of winning each game as an individual task, while somehow not focusing on the overall nature of being one game away from elimination and three away from a championship, they have a shot.
The Miami Heat will face a Lakers team that’s wearing all black on Friday, which is usually a message. Will the Heat get the message?
This team is built to do that. They have the right people leading them on and off the court, which should definitely help to solidify their mental fortitude on the scenario.
They must also overcome the nature of the officiating. For some reason, the Miami Heat haven’t gotten the same amounts of respect from the officials as their opponents.
This has been the case in each and every series. Though less noticeable in the Indiana series, it came to an ultimate head in the Milwaukee series.
It continued to be an issue that the Heat would eventually have to overcome in the Boston series and with LeBron James on the other side in this series, it has been an issue there as well. We won’t cry over that though, as it isn’t supposed to be easy when you are for the Miami Heat.
Lastly though, the Miami Heat must overcome the Los Angeles Lakers. That won’t be easy.
That goes double and especially when you consider the fact that they seem to have good intentions on ending things Friday. That’s at least the message they are sending with their jersey selection for the contest.
According to their own Twitter account, the Los Angeles Lakers announced that they will wear their famed “Mamba Jerseys” on Friday night. Those are the jerseys that Anthony Davis recently and now more famously said that they “never want to lose” in.
Basically and again, they are saying that Friday night is the end of it all. I am sure the guys in the Miami Heat locker room have taken notice.
Let’s see if we can change the narrative on their fancy threads.