ATLANTA — The Miami Heat’s road losing skid is over.
Despite not having star Jimmy Butler and a handful of others because of injuries, the Heat (10-11) managed to escape with a 106-98 victory over the Atlanta Hawks (11-9) on Sunday at State Farm Arena. Miami has won three straight after a 7-11 start to the season.
The result marked the Heat’s second road win of the season and snapped a seven-game skid in games played away from home. Miami stands at 2-7 on the road this season.
“Coach let us know that,” Heat forward Caleb Martin said when asked about ending the road losing streak. “He put that on the board, 1-7, which I didn’t even realize. I knew we were struggling on the road, but just to put it into perspective for us and see it on the board. Like he was saying, it’s pretty disgusting to us to see how good of a team we are and we’re 1-7 on the road.”
To end the road skid, the Heat needed another big game from center Bam Adebayo and a strong second-half defensive performance.
The Hawks were in control for nearly the entire of the first half, pulling ahead by as many as 11 points and entering halftime with a nine-point lead. The Heat shot just 5 of 16 (31.3 percent) from three-point range in the first two quarters.
But the Heat opened the third quarter on a 20-6 run to rally and take a five-point lead. Miami ended up outscoring Atlanta 34-21 in the third quarter to enter the final period ahead by four points.
Adebayo totaled 14 points on 5-of-7 shooting from the field to lead the Heat’s third-quarter surge. Miami’s defense also limited Atlanta to 21 points on 6-of-20 (30 percent) shooting from the field and 1-of-9 (11.1 percent) shooting from three-point range in the period.
The Heat extended its lead to as many as 14 points in the fourth quarter to cruise to the victory.
Adebayo was the star of the game, finishing with 32 points on 13-of-20 shooting from the field and 6-of-6 shooting from the foul line and eight rebounds.
Martin was also excellent, continuing arguably the best stretch of his NBA career with 20 points, nine rebounds, four assists, two steals and one block for the Heat. He totaled 18 points in the second half.
Heat guard Tyler Herro didn’t shoot the ball well, making just three of his 13 field-goal attempts. But he still managed to record the first triple-double of his NBA career with 11 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists.
The Hawks scored just 38 points on 31 percent shooting from the field in the second half. Miami outscored Atlanta 55-38 in the final two quarters.
The Heat continues its four-game trip with a two-game set in Boston that begins Wednesday against the Celtics in a rematch of last season’s Eastern Conference finals.
Five takeaways from the Heat’s win over the Hawks on Sunday:
Bam Adebayo again took on a bigger offensive role with Butler and others out.
In Friday’s win over the Washington Wizards, Adebayo finished with 38 points on 15-of-22 shooting from the field and 8-of-8 shooting from the foul line. It went down as the second-highest scoring game of his NBA career and he also set a new regular-season career-high for field goal attempts in a game.
Adebayo followed up that performance with 32 points and eight rebounds to lead the Heat to Sunday’s win.
Like on Friday, Adebayo did all of his work in the paint. Each of Adebayo’s 15 made field goals on Friday came from inside the paint and each of his 13 made baskets came from inside the paint on Sunday.
Adebayo entered averaging career-highs in points (19.9 per game) on 52.1 percent shooting from the field. But he has even turned it up a notch higher recently, averaging 24.2 points and 11.3 rebounds in his last six games entering Sunday’s contest.
The Heat had been one of the NBA’s worst third-quarter teams this season. On Sunday, the third quarter was Miami’s best quarter.
Entering Sunday, the Heat had been outscored by two points per third quarter, which was the sixth-worst third-quarter plus/minus in the league. Miami had actually been outscored in six of the previous seven third quarters before Sunday.
But in Atlanta, the Heat began its comeback with a dominant third-quarter performance.
The Heat outscored the Hawks 34-21 in the third quarter to turn a nine-point halftime deficit into a four-point lead entering the fourth quarter.
The possibility remains that Jimmy Butler will join the Heat during this four-game trip.
Butler missed his sixth straight game on Sunday because of right knee soreness. Along with Butler, the Heat was also without Gabe Vincent (left knee effusion), Duncan Robinson (left ankle sprain), Victor Oladipo (left knee tendinosis) and Omer Yurtseven (left ankle surgery) against the Hawks.
That left 11 available players for the Heat on Sunday.
Butler did not travel with the team to Atlanta and remained in Miami working his way back from injury. But the hope is that Butler will join the Heat at some point during the trip to make his return, possibly as soon as Wednesday against the Celtics in Boston.
Heat coach Erik Spoelstra left the door open for that possibility when asked about Butler’s status before Sunday’s game against the Hawks.
“He’s able to get some really good work in Miami,” Spoelstra said. “He is definitely getting better and we’ll just see how the week goes.”
The Hawks were also missing some members of its core on Sunday, with starting center Clint Capela (dental pain) and key reserve Bogdan Bogdanovic (right knee injury recovery) unavailable against the Heat.
With so many players again out, the Heat went with a bench rotation that included two undrafted rookies and a developmental prospect with limited NBA playing time.
The Heat’s bench rotation on Sunday included undrafted rookies Dru Smith and Jamal Cain, developmental forward Haywood Highsmith and veteran center Dewayne Dedmon. All four are undrafted players.
Rookie forward Nikola Jovic, who was deemed available and was in uniform, did not play on Sunday after starting the previous six games. He was listed as questionable for the contest because of right foot plantar fasciitis.
The Heat’s injury issues has depleted its bench, which entered Sunday as the league’s fifth-lowest scoring unit at 28.9 points per game. Miami closed last regular season as the NBA’s highest-scoring bench at 40.5 points per game.
The Hawks are a different team than they were last season in part because of the lessons they learned from their playoff series against the Heat.
The Heat dominated the Hawks in the first-round of last season’s playoffs, winning the series 4-1. Hawks star guard Trae Young could not solve the Heat’s switch-heavy defense, averaging just 15.4 points on 31.9 percent shooting from the field and 7-of-38 (18.4 percent) shooting on threes to go with a total of 30 assists and 30 turnovers in the series.
So the Hawks went out and traded for talented guard Dejounte Murray this past offseason to pair him with Young and form one of the NBA’s most dynamic backcourts.
“That we needed to get better,” Hawks coach Nate McMillan said of what Atlanta learned from last season’s playoff series against the Heat. “We needed to be more physical, we needed to be able to execute against a switching defense as Miami put on the floor. Basically, they switch one through five and they feel comfortable with their guards guarding bigs and their bigs guarding guards. They won that matchup. So we had to try to go out and get another player, which we did, to give us some extra firepower to attack that style of play.”
The Hawks entered Sunday’s game against the Heat outscoring opponents by 6.2 points per 100 possessions in the 448 minutes Murray and Young have played together this season.
