The second half and overtime of last nights loss to the Golden State Warriors was not the finest moment for this core group of Miami HEAT players. Too many live-ball turnovers, too many missed layups, too many inefficient jumpers taken. Blame has a way of wiggling its way into anything that wasnt perfect, but on Tuesday night, blame didnt have to do much wiggling at all.
But take out the disjointed final minutes of the fourth quarter and overtime, forget for a moment about the strange turnovers such as a rebound rolling between the legs of Udonis Haslem, or a pick-and-pop pass trickling out of bounds as the popper ran into a wall of bodies. Certainly those are issues to be fixed, but when you hold a team to a bad shooting night (40 percent) and simply keep uncharacteristically handing them extra possessions think back to Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals then the only mental hurdle that remains is the mere fact that Miami was, at one point, up 17 points.
Get past that, and it was otherwise an odd loss in the middle of January, one hardly indicative of losing habits.
Especially if you consider that the execution, taking the bad turnover possessions out of the analysis, was actually pretty good.
Miami had at least 10 missed opportunities within 10 feet of the rim in the fourth quarter last night, a number of those right at the rim, and they were not offensive put backs. These opportunities were Chris Bosh cutting down the middle lane, getting a bullet pass from Dwyane Wade and having a layup trickle off the side of the rim. They were Wade missing a short hook shot in the paint, or Haslem getting a perfect entry pass from LeBron James and bringing the ball down low to get fouled, losing out on a dunk opportunity. Another missed dunk here, a charge at the rim there, and the results of a 12-point quarter mar an effort that produced a number of good looks.
Last season, that would have been all that would be worth pointing out. But against teams like Dallas and Boston, and even in the first half against the Warriors, the HEAT have set a higher standard of execution for themselves.
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Miami only scored on six of the 21 possessions that Golden State ran a zone defense all in the first half which makes it easy to point to their continuing zone struggles, but its sets like these that show off actual continued progression against the zone.
And they can make it look good while theyre at it.
After a timeout Erik Spoelstra has his team scoring the second-most points per possession after timeouts in the league James receives the ball on the sidelines and the HEAT casually swing the ball around the perimeter, an action a zone will usually allow until a weakside defender chooses to jump the passing route. Then its just a matter of making the zone work against itself.
For starters, both Nate Robinson and Monta Ellis are accounted for, defending the two shooters at the top of the key. This leaves three Warriors in and around the paint defending two HEAT players, with James lurking open on the wing.
Step one is to clear the paint, so Bosh flashes to the right elbow, drawing the middle man, Kwame Brown, with him. One defender down. Step two is the seal the paint, so Joel Anthony flashes across the paint and sets a back screen on David Lee. Before James even begins his cut, you now have four Warriors attached to four HEAT bodies, but the fifth Warrior, because of the zone, is assigned to the far side of the floor. James takes the path of least resistance, Lee runs into Anthony, and Miami gets an easy bucket.
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This is actually a twist on a set the HEAT ran in almost the exact same situation against the Boston Celtics (Watch it Here) a couple of weeks ago, with the primary differences being the two players set up closer to the elbow and Norris Cole setting a screen for the corner man to initiate the action, instead of the wing player running right up to the ballhandler.
But the misdirection, and the result, is the same. Rather than setting the pick for James, Chalmers fakes the pick and runs through to the opposite wing. As Boston did, the Warriors anticipate the screen, with Brandon Rush releasing Chalmers. But James defender, having not had a screen set on him, doesnt switch, forcing Boshs man to rotate onto Chalmers in order to not give up the open three.
Bosh is meant to screen whoever chases Chalmers through the initial action, but since two defenders are left on James, theres nobody to screen. So Bosh slips the pick which hes doing at nearly double the rate he did last season and cuts down the lane.
Whether or not Bosh knows at this point that his defender has gone over to help on Chalmers, he knows, with the two defenders on James, that his action will force his defender to make a decision. Either Bosh or Chalmers, at this point, is getting a shot.
Perhaps Boshs defender felt safe helping on Chalmers because he thought he had help behind him, but thats why Spoelstra sends one of his corner shooters along the baseline on almost all of the dead-ball possessions we have looked at this year. When Battier cuts, it not only draws a defender out of an anticipatory position meaning a location where he can survey the floor and plan where to provide help defense but it changes the positioning that the defenders currently in actions up top expect behind them.
The defense, already out of position with two men on James, expects help that isnt there. And as with the video before, by the time the pass is received by the scorer, prior execution has removed all resistance.
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