The Miami Heat earned a crucial bounce-back 114-98 win Tuesday night against the Golden State Warriors on the second night of a back-to-back.
The Heat entered Tuesday night off a double-overtime loss to the Sacramento Kings after blowing a 17-point fourth-quarter lead. Miami owned a 14-point second-half lead with 6:38 left in the third quarter. A handful of Warrior triples plus Stephen Curry’s three-point play with 9:54 left cut their deficit to one. But two straight Nikola Jovic corner 3s followed by Alec Burks’ above-the-break triple made it a 10-point Heat advantage with over eight minutes left.
Miami didn’t let the lead dip below seven points the rest of the game, shooting 55.0 percent (11-20) and 5-of-11 from 3-point range in the period.
Nikola Jovic led the team with 20 points on 8-of-17 shooting, adding six rebounds, four assists and one steal in 34 minutes. Bam Adebayo had a terrific all-around bounce-back performance after an offensive clunker Monday night, tallying 19 points and nine rebounds on 9-of-14 shooting. Terry Rozier hilariously prevented Bam from securing another double-double, however.
Jaime Jaquez continued being aggressive and decisive, adding 18 points on 7-of-12 shooting with five rebounds; Duncan Robinson had 12 points on 4-of-5 from deep, though he dished out a team-most eight dimes, consistently making the right reads off movement (DHOs) all night.
Even though the Heat finished a minus-four on the glass, they turned the ball over less while having 32 assists on 43 made baskets. The rock was consistently finding the open man–especially down the stretch in the second half–putting the defense in rotation and spreading the wealth.
Miami’s win on Tuesday snaps their three-game losing streak, moving them to 18-17. They will now try to enact revenge on the Utah Jazz, who beat them by 36 last week inside Kaseya Center, on Thursday.
