Sweating in Miami
This was a grinding win for the Raptors on Boxing Day in Miami. Danny G made a corner 3 with about 22 ticks left to lift the boys to a 106-104 win over the Heat, who came in with the longest active winning streak in the NBA at five. We were down by as many as 17 at one point.
Nice pass by Serge, who looked a bit rusty in his first game back from injury, to set up the game-winning trey:
Both of my kids are on winter break this week. The second one will go back to her kindergarten next week, but the first one won't go back to school until late January. I have some unused vacation days that I've been using this month, and I am spending the last three this week to play the "stay-at-home dad."
Honestly, I don't feel like I've worked very much in December. It's been a roller-coaster of a year workload-wise. Because of the Winter Olympics in Korea, I worked for something like 40 straight days from mid-January to late-February. Then I traveled to Indonesia for the Asian Games in August, which meant, give or take, another 20 or so consecutive days without a break. I worked all 31 days in October for baseball postseason, PGA Tour and LPGA Tour, and then the first 13 days of November before getting some time off. And in the final month of the year, I've elevated "taking a break from work" to a whole new level. I will probably end up working less than half of this month.
Back to the blog.
Ugly Start
My kids are old enough to be kind of doing their own things when left alone without needing parental attention every moment. So I was able to pay my full attention to the game. And god, it was ugly. Maybe I would have been better off just playing with the kids.
No Kyle again. JV still weeks away. And Serge wasn't himself. We weren't making anything, and that's hardly new these days. Overall, just looked very sluggish coming out of the Christmas break. Sloppy with the ball, too.
There was one moment in the first half when Green missed a pass and turned the ball over, and Coach Nurse just put his head down for what seemed like an eternity. He was probably thinking, "What the hell are you guys doing?"
What the boys were doing was... Letting the Heat shoot 8-of-13 out of the gate and build a 19-8 lead. When it got to 23-10, I felt it was going to be a long day and I tried hard to stay interested. I kept tell myself there was a lot of basketball left.
We closed the 1Q down 31-23. Danny's 3 cut it to 32-28 in the 2Q, and we got on a 13-3 run to get to within one at 34-33.
But we quickly ran out of gas. The Heat responded with a run of their own and closed the half leading 58-44.
D and Some Luck
When we last played them, JV got the start at the 5 so he could contain Whiteside. Without him, Serge started at center but wasn't really a good match against the big guy. Whiteside was having his way in the paint.
But then in the 3Q, Whiteside took an elbow to the left side/groin area from Ibaka. It seemed harmless enough but Whiteside had to sit out for most of the quarter and had the area taped. And without him on the court, we started making a serious run. Talk about (an elbow) stroke of luck.
We were hanging around for a few minutes, and then Siakam's beautiful spin move in transition made it 74-65. Kawhi had a 3-point play and Green capped off a 10-0 run with a 3.
Now it was 74-71. We had a ball game on our hand. And Norm, who I think had a solid game playing within himself, made a bucket to put us up 81-79 heading into the 4Q.
We outscored the other guys 37-21 in 3Q
Memorable Finish
Both teams played some quality hoops in the final frame, and our defense really clamped down. We didn't give them easy looks like we did earlier in the game. Every shot was contested, and those guys starting rushing their attempts, too.
Kawhi's three with about 5 minutes to go gave us a 93-91 lead. At that point, I felt confident we could close out the Heat simply because we had Kawhi as our closer.
But the Heat scored 8 straight points over the next 2 or so minutes for a 99-93 lead. During that mini-run, Justise Winslow got away with blatant traveling.
(Once again, this was a terrible game by the refs. Kawhi got hammered down low a few times and never got anything, and then our guys got called for putting a hand on the other guys' arm or something like that. It was pretty annoying.)
But our boys kept their cool and put together one final run. Freddie made a 3, and Siakam made this outstanding 3-point play to get us back to within one:
On the next possession, Siakam fended off Whiteside to grab a huge defensive rebound, and Kawhi made two FTs for a 101-99 lead.
The two teams then traded some great baskets. D-Wade made a step-back 3, and Kawhi responded with a pull-up 2. Winslow made a tough runner off the glass for a 104-103 Head lead, and that was the last time they'd lead in this one.
Watch the Green shot again. It was a major defensive breakdown for the Heat.
They doubled Kawhi at the top, which is perfectly understandable. Serge set a screen and popped out to take the pass standing on a spot where he's usually money. He was open enough to take the shot, and though he was struggling from the field all game, I would have been perfectly happy with Serge taking that jumper.
But he probably saw in his peripheral vision that Danny was wide open. Meanwhile, James Johnson is hanging around under the basket with no Raptor within 10 feet. By the time he spots Green in the corner and rushes out to contest the shot, it was too late. If Johnson had been even a couple of feet closer to the corner, Danny G wouldn't have been able to take the three.
Green was 3-of-6 from downtown before that shot. Other than Kawhi, that was the last guy to leave open.
And I absolutely love how Kawhi had his arms up in celebration before the ball even left Danny's hands!
Wade and Winslow both missed contested 3s. Wade tried to tip Winslow's miss but fell short and it looked like it would have been an offensive basket interference anyway.
Parting Words
On a final note, CJ got the DNP-CD. He isn't doing the one thing he's paid big money to do, which is making three-pointers. Coach Nurse has given CJ every opportunity to turn things around but it hasn't happened. I think it was telling that CJ was benched in a tight game when we could use all the healthy bodies we had.
CJ is a better player/shooter than this. I hope he gets his touch back. If not, we should try to pick up a shooter at the trade deadline.
Nice pass by Serge, who looked a bit rusty in his first game back from injury, to set up the game-winning trey:
Both of my kids are on winter break this week. The second one will go back to her kindergarten next week, but the first one won't go back to school until late January. I have some unused vacation days that I've been using this month, and I am spending the last three this week to play the "stay-at-home dad."
Honestly, I don't feel like I've worked very much in December. It's been a roller-coaster of a year workload-wise. Because of the Winter Olympics in Korea, I worked for something like 40 straight days from mid-January to late-February. Then I traveled to Indonesia for the Asian Games in August, which meant, give or take, another 20 or so consecutive days without a break. I worked all 31 days in October for baseball postseason, PGA Tour and LPGA Tour, and then the first 13 days of November before getting some time off. And in the final month of the year, I've elevated "taking a break from work" to a whole new level. I will probably end up working less than half of this month.
Back to the blog.
Ugly Start
My kids are old enough to be kind of doing their own things when left alone without needing parental attention every moment. So I was able to pay my full attention to the game. And god, it was ugly. Maybe I would have been better off just playing with the kids.
No Kyle again. JV still weeks away. And Serge wasn't himself. We weren't making anything, and that's hardly new these days. Overall, just looked very sluggish coming out of the Christmas break. Sloppy with the ball, too.
There was one moment in the first half when Green missed a pass and turned the ball over, and Coach Nurse just put his head down for what seemed like an eternity. He was probably thinking, "What the hell are you guys doing?"
What the boys were doing was... Letting the Heat shoot 8-of-13 out of the gate and build a 19-8 lead. When it got to 23-10, I felt it was going to be a long day and I tried hard to stay interested. I kept tell myself there was a lot of basketball left.
We closed the 1Q down 31-23. Danny's 3 cut it to 32-28 in the 2Q, and we got on a 13-3 run to get to within one at 34-33.
But we quickly ran out of gas. The Heat responded with a run of their own and closed the half leading 58-44.
D and Some Luck
When we last played them, JV got the start at the 5 so he could contain Whiteside. Without him, Serge started at center but wasn't really a good match against the big guy. Whiteside was having his way in the paint.
But then in the 3Q, Whiteside took an elbow to the left side/groin area from Ibaka. It seemed harmless enough but Whiteside had to sit out for most of the quarter and had the area taped. And without him on the court, we started making a serious run. Talk about (an elbow) stroke of luck.
We were hanging around for a few minutes, and then Siakam's beautiful spin move in transition made it 74-65. Kawhi had a 3-point play and Green capped off a 10-0 run with a 3.
Now it was 74-71. We had a ball game on our hand. And Norm, who I think had a solid game playing within himself, made a bucket to put us up 81-79 heading into the 4Q.
We outscored the other guys 37-21 in 3Q
Memorable Finish
Both teams played some quality hoops in the final frame, and our defense really clamped down. We didn't give them easy looks like we did earlier in the game. Every shot was contested, and those guys starting rushing their attempts, too.
Kawhi's three with about 5 minutes to go gave us a 93-91 lead. At that point, I felt confident we could close out the Heat simply because we had Kawhi as our closer.
But the Heat scored 8 straight points over the next 2 or so minutes for a 99-93 lead. During that mini-run, Justise Winslow got away with blatant traveling.
(Once again, this was a terrible game by the refs. Kawhi got hammered down low a few times and never got anything, and then our guys got called for putting a hand on the other guys' arm or something like that. It was pretty annoying.)
But our boys kept their cool and put together one final run. Freddie made a 3, and Siakam made this outstanding 3-point play to get us back to within one:
On the next possession, Siakam fended off Whiteside to grab a huge defensive rebound, and Kawhi made two FTs for a 101-99 lead.
The two teams then traded some great baskets. D-Wade made a step-back 3, and Kawhi responded with a pull-up 2. Winslow made a tough runner off the glass for a 104-103 Head lead, and that was the last time they'd lead in this one.
Watch the Green shot again. It was a major defensive breakdown for the Heat.
They doubled Kawhi at the top, which is perfectly understandable. Serge set a screen and popped out to take the pass standing on a spot where he's usually money. He was open enough to take the shot, and though he was struggling from the field all game, I would have been perfectly happy with Serge taking that jumper.
But he probably saw in his peripheral vision that Danny was wide open. Meanwhile, James Johnson is hanging around under the basket with no Raptor within 10 feet. By the time he spots Green in the corner and rushes out to contest the shot, it was too late. If Johnson had been even a couple of feet closer to the corner, Danny G wouldn't have been able to take the three.
Green was 3-of-6 from downtown before that shot. Other than Kawhi, that was the last guy to leave open.
And I absolutely love how Kawhi had his arms up in celebration before the ball even left Danny's hands!
Wade and Winslow both missed contested 3s. Wade tried to tip Winslow's miss but fell short and it looked like it would have been an offensive basket interference anyway.
Parting Words
On a final note, CJ got the DNP-CD. He isn't doing the one thing he's paid big money to do, which is making three-pointers. Coach Nurse has given CJ every opportunity to turn things around but it hasn't happened. I think it was telling that CJ was benched in a tight game when we could use all the healthy bodies we had.
CJ is a better player/shooter than this. I hope he gets his touch back. If not, we should try to pick up a shooter at the trade deadline.
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