As the Miami Heat face the Detroit Pistons on Wednesday night, there is no doubt that the team is trying to snap the eight-game skid they’re currently on and find some positive momentum heading into the end of the season. The Heat’s eight-game losing streak is the longest under head coach Erik Spoelstra, putting it into perspective how grueling this part of the year has been as the team looks for answers.
After Miami lost to the New York Knicks on Monday, it marked another game where the unit had a double-digit lead, albeit early in the contest where they led 12-0, and lost it. That makes them now tied for first in the NBA along with the Utah Jazz with 18 games for the most blown double-digit leads.
The Heat also has three straight games scoring under 100 points as the current NBA record this season is four and not to mention the other concerning trends in the fourth quarter and more. As Jaime Jaquez Jr. said after Monday’s defeat, the team is currently “going through the dark days right now” according to The Miami Herald.
“It’s frustrating. We’re going through the dark days right now. I think as a team, we just got to come together and find a new fight these last however many games we got left.”
So how can Miami turn this around?
Accountability is the first step towards a turnaround for the Heat
As the Heat look to lift their spirits by overcoming this massive hurdle, there needs to first be some accountability from the coaches and the players which there has been already. Besides such stars as Tyler Herro and Bam Adebayo, Spoelstra would be candid after the Knicks loss and say that “no one” is safe from being criticized within the team, especially himself, admitting that this season has “been one of the biggest challenges” in his career.
“There’s no one that’s absolved from this,” Spoelstra said Monday night. “I have not come up with enough answers for this team. I have to do a better job. Our group has to do a better job.
“That’s the thing that we’ve been racking our time, our brains, everything, trying to find solutions for that,” Spoelstra continued. “We have not come up with solutions and we’ve pretty much tried everything. That’s why I said, I haven’t been able to come up with solutions for that. This has been one of the biggest challenges of a regular season that I’ve been a part of. And we just have to stay the course.”
The inability to sustain leads has hurt the Heat
It has been easy to see the Heat’s fatal flaw this season which Spoelstra alluded to as it’s been the inability to sustain double-digit leads as it could be mind-boggling where the team would be if they won half of those heartbreaking losses. With 14 games left in the regular season, the team needs to figure out how to “sustain” leads which was expressed by Herro.
“We just got to figure out how to sustain a full game,” Herro said in the locker room after the loss in New York. “It’s been our problem really all year… Anyone would just quit and get comfortable with losing and feel sorry for themselves. Obviously, nobody feels sorry for us. We have to dig ourselves out of this hole. It all starts in this locker room.”
From the eye-test, it has felt that the current skid has impacted the way the team has played which definitely shows in the second halves of games. Spoelstra would emphasize on this point that despite the losing streak, “they don’t have to impact the next game.”
“We have to collectively get our mind right, where all of these losses don’t necessarily, they don’t have to impact the next game,” Spoelstra said. “That’s the mental discipline and that is a tough human condition to fight. It’s human nature to stack up some of these memories and let that affect us for the next game.”
Starting with the mental aspect of the group, the Heat’s famed culture has been known for their mental toughness, underdog status, and ability to overcome any obstacle thrown their way. At the moment, that’s not showing, but despite the little time remaining, no better place to start than Wednesday night.
Heat going through “growing pains”
There’s no doubt been “growing pains” for the Heat, especially Adebayo and Herro since the trade involving Jimmy Butler to the Golden State Warriors. One could make the argument that the whole situation involving Butler stained the season due to the back and forth drama with that bleeding over to the era without the star.
However, the two leaders and the rest of the team have a prime opportunity in this upcoming five-game home stand to bring positivity back to the organization. It does start with the two aforementioned players as while Herro has made enormous strides on the court, there has been multiple instances where he’s been gassed late in games with the clutch statistics showing negative results.
As for Adebayo, he had seen an offensive resurgence the past six or seven weeks, but has lost a bit of steam. There could be an easy reason for this as the duo are still not used to being the first two options on the team with Butler gone, which leads to how crucial Andrew Wiggins is as the third option when games go awry as he looks to get more comfortable.
Heat needs better from players and coaches
Still, as the Heat look to get back their fearless nature, the team can’t let human nature fully take over as while sn eight-game skid could have doubt creep into their psychosis, Adebayo is confident in the mindsets of the team.
“No. I’m going to keep willing that,” Adebayo said. “I don’t care. When we step out there, we’re going to compete. Now as far as the games and the losses, you take that game by game. But every night we step on that court, I’m going to make sure I play hard and everybody else does.”
Miami needs its two stars to lead, the supporting cast to produce, and Spoelstra putting the players in the best spots possible to succeed. As mentioned before, the team has been been receiving haymakers mentally and physically, on and off the court, but now is the time to start fighting back.
“We have to take strides, where we’re making progress,” Spoelstra said. “And it felt like we were making progress even with some of the losses in the last three weeks. We felt like we were making strides. The last two games haven’t felt like we’re making those kinds of strides.”
At any rate, the Heat are now 10 games under .500 at 29-39 which puts them 10th in the Eastern Conference before the integral five-game home stand.
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