Confidence Meter 7.5 (simmering)
• A 30-point drubbing deserves another. Do not bat an eye at the score and Erik Spoelstra‘s reluctance to go to the bench till the Spurs pulled their starters. Even then, the final unit had two three-point shooters in Mike Miller and James Jones along with starting point guard Mario Chalmers. No information on this, but I would venture to guess that they wanted to win by at least 30, if they could. Yes. They. Did.
• Chris Bosh with a 30 and 12 game on 10-16 shooting. That is a Big game versus a team that defends the post very well. He also asked for the ball incessantly and converted on all his pick and roll attempts. The Heat are just better when he “rolls” on the Pick and Roll instead of “popping” and shooting jumpers. He was a handful challenging shots as well, and had a very good defensive game. The Heat do take on a look of invincibility when Bosh plays well. That is not Hyperbole either.
• The Spurs made 17 three’s in the first meeting, 6 in this one. That was more about the Heat playing with speed and getting out to shooters than scheme. This was about effort. LeBron James alluded to it in the postgame comments on ESPN. The Team played with an edge and carried it throughout the game.
• Jamaal Magloire made an appearance and Big Cat played BIG. His contribution was bigger than a boxscore. He drew three rebounding fouls and that should count more than an actual rebound, so his boxscore numbers begin to look better if you take that into consideration. Big Cat is known as an “aggressor” and he used that tonight imposing his physicality on an undersized San Antonio team.
• Mario Chalmers is on a very good streak of good basketball. He just might have turned the corner and is now a guy you can count on to hit open shots and play pesky defense. Make no mistake, Tony Parker was a problem for the point guards tonight and had a run of dominance in the third quarter that threatened to make this a game. Spo went to the no point guard lineup with Mike Miller in the back court and that put an end to it by zoning the top of the key and allowing Parker to shoot open jumpers if he wanted. He continued to attack and that turned into 2 turnovers and 4 points for the Heat to gain some breathing room. Nice piece of coaching if I am allowed to say so.
• Coach Gregg Popovich said in his post game press conference that “What goes around comes around” alluding to how the Heat got payback in the same fashion as the Spurs dished it out 10 days earlier. This game, however, did not feature an aberation such as a franchise record for three pointers made. This was a dominant effort by a talented team playing in front of a raucous crowd. The scoreboard watching shows a Celtics team in free fall and a Bulls team poised to take the #1 spot. It is not inconceivable that the Celtics could find themselves in the #3 spot very soon.
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