26 Thoughts on the Heat's Convincing Win Over the Bulls, Including a Swarming Defense
The Miami Heat should feel good about a potential playoff matchup with the Bulls.
Twenty-six thoughts from the Miami Heat’s 112-99 win over the Chicago Bulls at FTX Arena Monday night to go two games up for the No. 1 seed in the East.
Erik Spoelstra arrived to the postgame media session several minutes later than usual. “Sorry, I forgot about you guys,” he said, smiling as he entered the room. Clearly, he was basking in the satisfaction of beating the No. 2 seed in the East thanks to a dominate defensive performance.
DeMar DeRozan’s 30-point streak ends at 10 games thanks to the Heat’s stifling defense. It took a team effort to hold him to 18 points on 7 for 16 shooting, but such has been the case all season for the league’s fifth-rated defense.
Among Heat players, P.J. Tucker spent the most time on DeRozan, holding him to 0 for 2 shooting (according to my charting) while he defended him. Two is the most important number there. DeRozan’s 16 shot attempts were his fewest since Jan. 30.
It was the fewest points DeRozan has scored since Jan. 14 (17 against the Golden State Warriors).
This game could serve as a highlight reel for Bam Adebayo’s defensive player of the year candidacy. The Heat outscored the Bulls by a team-best 20 points when Adebayo was on the floor. His 15 points on a tidy 6 for 8 shooting and five assists were certainly a helpful factor, but his swarming defense stifled Chicago’s fourth-rated offense.
“Defensive player of the year,” Gabe Vincent said while sitting next to Adebayo at the post-game media session.
The matchup to watch going into this game was Adebayo vs. Nikola Vucevic, who has made a career in Orlando and Chicago of clobbering the Heat.
But not tonight. Just 14 points on 7 for 14 shooting and a mesely seven rebounds for Vucevic. Oh, and a minus-21, with many of those minutes coming when Adebayo was on the court.
In other words, Adebayo ate Vucevic’s lunch.
Really, he ate everyone’s lunch. I mean, look at this. Adebayo starts this sequence by getting switched onto Coby White, smothers and forces White to lob it up to Vucevic and somehow turns and gets up to swat the ball out of the air.
No Kyle Lowry tonight, who was out for personal reasons. There is no timetable for his return, but Vincent did a bang-up job starting in his place at point guard.
Vincent finished with 20 points on 7 for 13 shooting and three assists but, most importantly, no turnovers.
Those 20 points tied Tyler Herro for a team-high.
Coming out of the All-Star break, it’s now three-straight games of 20-plus points for Herro (30, 27 and 20).
Four steals for Butler — all in the first quarter — to set the tone defensively.
“We have our team rules,” Spoelstra said of Butler freelancing for takeaways, “and then we have the Jimmy Butler rules.”
With about four minutes left in the third quarter, Tucker attempted to use a Chicago Bulls towel to wipe some sweat from his forehead during Bulls free throws. Tristan Thompson pulled it away from him mid-wipe. Then the two started some (I think) light-hearted chirping.
Thompson was trash-talking all game.
He was a minus-2, did not make a shot and grabbed only one rebound in 16 1/2 minutes.
The Heat (41-21) are 3-0 against the Bulls (39-23) this season. No matter what happens in the final matchup on April 2, they will own the tie-breaker in the event that it becomes a factor.
The Heat are also now 11-7 against the top-five seed in each conference.
In terms of a potential playoff meeting against the Bulls, the Heat should feel confident.
Sure, the Bulls were without Lonzo Ball and Alex Caruso tonight, but the Heat defense has made things difficult on the Bulls offense all season. Adebayo’s ability to close combined with Jimmy Butler and Caleb Martin (and, when available, Lowry) fighting around screens erases the usual space DeRozan and Zach LaVine (22 points on 8 for 16 tonight) usually find in the mid-range area.
Through the first three quarters, the Bulls totaled just 67 points on 42.9% shooting (just 3 of 21 on 3s) and coughed up 12 turnovers.
“They’re a great offensive team, so that’ll catch your attention pretty quickly,” Spoelstra said. “The core of Jimmy and Bam and P.J. just gives you a lot of dynamic, multi-faceted, positionless defenders that can cover a lot of ground and also have the experience and savviness to defend highly-skilled offensive players.”
The Heat travel to take on the Milwaukee Bucks on Wednesday. Another they’ll try to walk away with another win against another Eastern Conference contender.