The Miami Heat and Cleveland Cavaliers played each other for the second consecutive time. And just like Wednesday’s game, this one ended up being close. In the first half, the Heat struggled with mindless turnovers. Donovan Mitchell was on a scoring clinic as well. Despite this, the Heat still battled and stayed in the game. Miami took the lead in the 4th quarter and kept it the rest of the way. With the win, Miami is now 36-32 for the season. Here are my takeaways from Miami’s victory over Cleveland.
Turnovers Continue Cause Problems
As mentioned earlier, the Heat struggled with turnovers for the second consecutive game. Miami continued to have careless turnovers in Friday’s game. Part of the reason comes from having guards who aren’t pass first guards. Gabe Vincent, who plays better off the ball, is not a lead guard. And that was evident throughout the night with his passing. Tyler Herro also had some careless turnovers in the game as well. There were a couple of plays where he was dribbling circles around the Cavaliers defenders with nothing coming out of it. Miami finished the night with 16 turnovers. With the Heat guards being tasked with making more offensive reads, they need to take better care of the basketball.
Jimmy Takeover
Since the NBA All-Star break, Jimmy Butler has been playing exceptionally well. Most importantly, he’s been very efficient from the field. And it’s coming at a time where Miami really needs it. In the third period, Miami’s offense went stagnant. There were turnovers and the Heat’s ball movement was nonexistent. With the Heat offense slowing down in the third quarter, Butler went into takeover mode. Butler became more aggressive and was even knocking down his jumpers. Outside of that, he was getting to basket whenever he wanted to. Whether it was off the mid-to-low post actions or the straight-line drives. This is the Butler the Heat are going to need the rest of the way. Butler finished with 33 points and five rebounds.
Three-Point Shooting Comes Alive in Second Half
If you followed the Heat all season, you know about their three-point shooting struggles. Miami has ranked in the bottom half of all teams in three-point shooting. Most of the three-point shooting percentages have come from the regression of their best shooters. That continued the be the case in the first half, with only three made from downtown. However, the shooting started to pick up in the second half. Herro knocked down a couple in the fourth quarter that gave the Heat the lead. Max Strus, who’s struggled all season with his shooting, came alive in the second half and hit timely three-pointers. As a team, Miami finished the night with 14 made three-pointers on 48 percent shooting.
Lowry Return on Saturday?
The Bally Sports Sun crew made an interesting comment before the game started. Eric Reid hinted that there’s a good possibility that Kyle Lowry will return for Saturday’s game against the Orlando Magic. Lowry has missed the past 15 games due to knee soreness. In his absence, the primary ball handling duties have been given to Vincent and Victor Oladipo as well. It hasn’t been a good season for Lowry, but the Heat are hoping he can help improve the decision making from their guards. We’ll see how Lowry’s return will impact the Heat’s rotation as well.
Next: Orlando Magic on Saturday. Game tips off at 7pm eastern.
