Miami Heat come up short vs. Atlanta Hawks on Haslem’s night
MIAMI — The guest list seemingly could not have set up better for the Miami Heat on the night they retired Udonis Haslem’s jersey.
Not only were Dwyane Wade, Tim Hardaway, Pat Riley and Goran Dragic seated on the court at the halftime ceremony, but missing from those in attendance was Trae Young, with the Atlanta Hawks guard back home dealing with an illness.
Against that backdrop, and with the Heat playing the second half with No. 40 hanging at midcourt, it set up as a night to remember.
Instead, it turned into something forgettable, the Heat unable to get a potential game-winning shot off in time in what turned into a 109-108 loss Friday night at Kaseya Center.
“I’m sick we lost this game, just because he embodies winning,” Heat center Bam Adebayo said. “I’m really down we lost this game on his night.
“He’s probably going to call me at 4 a.m. because he won’t be able to sleep.”
The game ended off a Heat inbounds play with 2 seconds to play, when Jimmy Butler and Caleb Martin bypassed shots as time expired.
“That was a poor play call,” coach Erik Spoelstra said. “I’m disappointed in my call. I had something else in mind.”
Coming off Wednesday night’s ugly road loss to the Toronto Raptors, it opened the second half of the Heat’s schedule with yet another troubling loss.
Butler and Tyler Herro each scored 25 for the Heat, who also got 21 points, nine rebounds and six assists from Adebayo..
Dejounte Murray, whose 3-pointer in transition closed the scoring, led the Hawks with 22 points and a season-high 11 rebounds.
The Heat next play Sunday in Atlanta before returning home for home games on Wednesday and Thursday nights against the Memphis Grizzlies and Boston Celtics.
Five Degrees of Heat from Friday night’s game:
1. Closing time: The Hawks led 32-24 after the first period, a period the Heat closed 10 of 26 from the field, 2 of 10 on 3-pointers. Atlanta then led 57-56 at halftime.
Halftime, scheduled for 25 minutes for Haslem’s jersey retirement, then went 36 minutes.
From there, the Heat opened the third quarter with an 11-2 run, forcing, but after pushing to a nine-point lead, the advantage was down to 83-81 going into the fourth.
That is when Butler took his rest at the top of the fourth, before returning with 8:46 remaining in an 87-87 game.
Then, with 5:29, off a wild scramble that included turnovers by both teams, Heat guard Josh Richardson converted a four-point play for a 97-92 Heat lead.
But back pushed the Hawks to a 102-98 lead with 2:32 to play, with turnovers continuing to plague the Heat.
A 3-point play by Butler with 1:54 left then gave the Heat a 103-102 lead, with an Adebayo jumper making it 105-102 with 66 seconds to play, Later, a Herro floating 3-pointer with 35.5 seconds remaining made it 108-104 Heat.
The Hawks closed within 108-106 with 30 seconds to play on a pair of Bojan Bogdanovic free throws with a Murray 3-pointer in transition then putting Atlanta up 109-108 with 2 seconds to play.
“He hit an extremely tough shot,” Spoelstra said. “I thought our best guy on him, Caleb, didn’t back up. He picked him up at halfcourt and tried to level him off.
“But that’s a 26-foot shot.”
Off a timeout, the Heat were unable to get a shot off before time expired, with Butler passing to Martin, who was late on his attempt.
“I probably should’ve shot it though to be brutally honest,” Butler said. “I passed the ball to Caleb, and I put him in a terrible position.”
2. Lineup No. 23: The Heat opened the second half of their 82-game schedule with lineup No. 23, with Martin moving into the first five in place of Kyle Lowry, as Adebayo, Nikola Jovic, Jimmy Butler and Herro continued to start.
It was Martin’s 11th start, but first since Christmas, the final game of a 10-game run as starter before missing seven games with an ankle sprain.
Those previous Martin starts, however, came at power forward, with Nikola Jovic on Friday night continuing in that role, making his ninth consecutive start.
Lowry entered for the first time with 3:49 left in the opening period
Amid speculation of Lowry not starting due to a team matter, Spoelstra only would say, “With Jaime (Jaquez Jr.) out, there are some moving parts with this. I’m not going to be just experimenting the second half. This is about winning right now. But the combinations and lineups do matter, and having Kyle kind of anchor that second unit while Jaime’s out, I think is important.
“We’ll just see. We’ll do whatever we have to do in the second half of the season.”
3. Efficient again: Two games after going for 31 points on 8-of-12 shooting in a road victory over the Brooklyn Nets, Butler this time was up to 18 through three quarters on 6-of-7 shooting at that stage.
Butler’s efficiency was needed with Adebayo 4 of 11 through three quarters and Kevin Love 0 for 5 at that stage.
Midway through the fourth quarter, Butler was 8 of 9 from the foul line when the Hawks were 7 of 10 as a team.
Butler’s second miss of the night from the field did not come until 1:16 remained.
4. Robinson early: After scoring 27 points in 25 minutes against the Hawks in December in a Heat victory, Robinson this time had 14 points in his first 10 minutes Friday.
When the Hawks called time with 3:56 left in the second period, after the Heat took their first lead, Robinson was 4 of 6 on 3-pointers, with the rest of the Heat roster 3 of 12 from beyond the arc.
Robinson led the Heat with 14 first half points, but did not score again.
5. No Trae, but Dejounte: While the Hawks were without Young, Spoelstra warned about Murray doing even more in Young’s absence.
That turned out to be the case with Murray scoring 15 points in the first half and from there moving to his double-double..
What made the timing particularly curious is that Murray has been linked in trade rumors to several teams, including the Heat.
Hawks coach Quin Snyder was asked pregame about the conjecture.
“Guys know there’s always chatter,” Snyder said. “Those are things you don’t respond to. It’s part of life in the NBA.”
