MIAMI – As the Miami Heat looked to lift their spirits on Friday night, it was a step in the wrong direction as the team lost to the Boston Celtics, 103-91. While the Heat are looking to make a late playoff push, the loss marks their sixth straight, which is a season-high and have lost every contest of this five-game home stand to add on to the frustration which Tyler Herro showed after the game.
Andrew Wiggins led the team with 23 points, but Herro would finish with 19 points on seven for 15 shooting from the field, three of eight from deep, to go along with six assists and five rebounds. While Herro said after Wednesday’s loss that he’s an “even-keeled” person, there is no doubt frustration after losing six straight and five straight at home.
“Yeah, no one likes losing, no one in this locker room is a loser. We want to win. So obviously frustration,” Herro said to ClutchPoints after the defeat.
Here are three takeaways from Miami’s six straight loss, this time to Boston:
Heat stay competitive with Celtics to close out first half
As the Heat are looking to get back their fearless nature, the beginning of the game wasn’t a great start in helping that as Boston started four of four from deep, making Spoelstra have to call an early timeout down 12-4 with 9:33 left in the first period. The Celtics built up a 14-point lead in the first though Miami would close the frame on a 9-4 modest run to get their deficit out of double-digits.
Miami would stay poised despite the initial offensive outburst by Boston and make a major turnaround in the second period where they got their first lead of the game at 39-37 with 5:34 left in the quarter. By the end of the first half, the Heat and Celtics would be tied at 50 apiece as while the beginning was rocky, the home team recovered impressively.
The Celtics lived and died by the three in the first half as they attempted 28 of them while only making 17, where they ended up shooting 37.8 percent from the field. Where Miami thrived was in the paint as they outscored Boston 26-12 in that area while shooting 52.6 percent from the field, though they only made five threes out of 16 attempts.
It would be a huge second quarter for Andrew Wiggins who had 10 points on four of five shooting from the field as Tyler Herro had seven on three four five shooting from the field. For Boston, while Jrue Holiday and had 16, they held Jayson Tatum to 12 points on three of 11 shooting from the field.
A disappointing ending for the Heat, even if most predicted the outcome
With the Heat trying to gain back their belief, especially after the impressive first half, they and the Celtics traded haymakers in the third period. Miami would be outscored by Boston, 28-27, in the frame, but still kept the game competitive while the away team found more of their groove.
After struggling from deep in the first half, the Heat shot six of nine from beyond the arc, but only made three other field goals since they were nine of 17 from the field. Still, the Celtics shot 11 of 18 from the field and five of 12 from three as Tatum rebounded in the third with 11 points as Holiday contributed another nine.
When it came to the fourth quarter, all the good work Miami did well in the previous two periods had gone away as they couldn’t keep up with the well-oiled machine of Boston. The Heat started the final frame cold as they made only one of their first nine shots from the field and missed all five attempts from three-point range.
The team picked the worst time to have a 14-point quarter as even with the Celtics missing Jaylen Brown and Kristaps Porzingis, they still have pieces where the task is to outlast them offensively and defensively. There is no doubt the loss marks another frustrating outing where Miami had many opportunities to capitalize and gain a huge win, but there still looking to break their skid.
Heat with new additions in the starting lineup against the Celtics
An interesting announcement by the team beforehand was bringing out a new starting lineup as the Heat continues to experiment with minutes as they have done with Kel’el Ware. Speaking of the rookie, after being a mainstay in the starting lineup’s front court alongside Adebayo, he was benched alongside newcomer Davion Mitchell.
Instead, it was Jaime Jaquez Jr. and Duncan Robinson who went in as the thinking probably was Spoelstra going smaller to match Boston’s speed and especially ability to shoot from three so adding some shooting and perimeter defense was vital. Another interesting aspect was the absence of Heat guard Terry Rozier who is amidst a disappointing season who didn’t log a single second Friday night.
If there is one thing for sure about Spoelstra, he will continue to experiment with the rotations, even if there are only 16 games left in the season. Miami is now 29-37 as they look to quickly turnaround and play in the second game of the back-to-back, facing the Memphis Grizzlies on the road on Saturday.
