Depth Has Been The Biggest Key For The Miami Heat This Season
The Miami Heat are now just 12 wins from winning an NBA championship.
After defeating the Atlanta Hawks in the first round of the playoffs, the consensus reason for the possibility is their depth.
Here’s what the Heat had to say about it:
Coach Erik Spoelstra after Tuesday’s Game 5 win: “No question, this was just a really inspiring team win. Everybody that played had their fingerprints on this. We clearly had some adversity in this game. Not having Kyle or Jimmy and our group doesn’t even blink. It’s not even something that we have to address. We just pivot and put in the gameplan and everybody just gets ready, tapes their ankles and gets out there and competes.”
“Defensively, there were some incredibly inspiring plays. All game long. We got some timely scores, they stepped up their defense, but I thought Bam was just tremendous. It was just winning basketball all the way around. Vic was really good again. He was able to generate some looks for us in the paint and we just carried it through to the end. I thought it was fitting as well that we had to get this game with a stop at the end.”
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Center Bam Adebayo: “I feel like the biggest thing about this game was our defense. Just getting steals in crunch moments and being able to score off that. That fed it to the crowd. That fed into our energy. “P.J. Tucker [makes us special on defense]. He’s the lifeline of our defense. He doesn’t get as much credit as he should in my opinion. The way he has everybody’s back, one through five, and gives ultimate effort. Just having a teammate like that, he’s the real reason why our defense is the way it is.”
Guard Victor Oladipo: Tonight was a collective team win. A lot of guys stepped up and did great things for us. I’m just happy and glad to be a part of it. A lot of things that ya’ll don’t see, or that people don’t see, is how huge Jimmy and Kyle were on the bench today. They were like coaches. Jimmy helped me tremendously in the fourth quarter. You won’t see it, obviously, in the box score. You won’t see it unless someone tells you. I appreciate him, we appreciate Kyle and we can’t wait until they get healthy and get back out there and helping us win. We have a lot of guys, one through 15, that are ready to go at all times. Credit us. Credit the coaching staff, organization, for helping us stay ready. I think that’s important. I think it’s not just us, it’s everyone. The whole organization. Upper office, people who work in ticket sales, everybody. It’s a collective thing in order to be successful. You gotta credit everybody for that in this win, for our season so far and for where we are gonna go.”
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