The Miami Heat had a contest on Monday night against the Boston Celtics, however, somebody apparently didn’t remind them of that. Coming into the game, they knew they would be without their best player in Jimmy Butler, while they would also be without P.J. Tucker as well.
They’ve been without Kyle Lowry for the last few games, so that wasn’t a huge shocker. Then again, neither should have P.J. Tucker‘s or Jimmy’s absence have been, as they were both banged up a bit in the last contest.
You know, the triple-overtime thriller against the Toronto Raptors. Speaking of, the Miami Heat will face the Toronto Raptors again on Tuesday, the second time in less than a few days where you face that team on the second part of a back-to-back.
That’s neither here nor there though, as it was the first part of a back-to-back that was a tragedy on Monday. Plain and simple, the Miami Heat didn’t give a maximum effort when they needed to.
You are used to seeing a certain type of gritty play from this Heat team, not allowing the easy stuff with great frequency, and that was something you just didn’t see a ton of on Monday.
The Miami Heat were to be without some key guys in Boston on Monday night. However, losing by 30 points was never an expected outcome.
Well, there was that and a lot of just flat-out shot-making by the Celtics. That’s all while the Heat side couldn’t make shots.
If you wanted to have some key takeaways from the game, it would be these. This was a game where you thought that Tyler Herro would bounce back.
Frankly, he was supposed to go nuts with the opportunity to have free reign over the ball without Jimmy Butler, Kyle Lowry, or PJ Tucker, a huge scorer for the Miami Heat this season, being in the lineup.
He wasn’t able to capitalize on the opportunity. Bam Adebayo, in an often-told tale, also wasn’t aggressive enough, only taking 11 field goal attempts.
This was tied for third on the team with Caleb Martin. Max Strus did have a big night, going for 27 points, while going 9-17 on threes, and 9-19 from the field.
Listen, this isn’t an excuse as to why they lost the game, to blame Tyler Herro, or Bam Adebayo for the defeat in any way as again, the Boston Celtics were just a team on a mission Monday night.
However, you do also expect better from those two and especially when the opportunity arises for them to have the dominant reign over the ball, as mentioned. All in all on this one, you chalk it up to a terrible game and hope for better on Tuesday in Toronto.