Heat’s late comeback attempt falls short to the Pistons, lose 138-135

The Miami Heat’s comeback attempt fell short against the East’s top seed Pistons on Saturday night— snapping a six-game winning streak.
(Photo via Miami Heat/X)

Heading into Saturday’s matchup against the visiting Detroit Pistons was a huge test from the start. The Miami Heat secured several statement wins this season thus far, but the top seed Pistons’ physicality posed too much of a challenge in this one, as they defeated Miami with a final score of 138-135.

The final score does not show how dominant Detroit looked. The Heat were down by as many as 20+ plus points in the second half, and got pummeled in the paint against Detroit’s physical play style. The loss snapped a six-game winning streak for Miami, dropping them to a 13-7 record overall and down to the fourth seed. Detroit improved to an impressive 16-4 as they remain 2.0 games atop of the Eastern Conference standings.

Cade Cunningham’s 29 points and 8 assists on 14 of 25 shooting led the way for the Pistons, along with icing the game to put them up by four points in the final seconds. Tobias Harris also scorched the Heat defense with 26 points on a near-perfect 10 of 12 shooting. In his first return to Miami as a member of the Pistons, Duncan Robinson dropped an 18/5/5 all-around statline on 50% shooting as Detroit’s starting shooting guard alongside Cunningham in the backcourt.

The biggest disparity of the night was indeed the difference in total paint points, where Detroit head a 30+ edge. In a game that the Pistons’ star big man Jalen Duren sat out due to injury, their aggression down low still got the best of the Heat. They also shot 59% from the field as a team compared to Miami’s 50%.

Detroit led for majority of the night , and this game wouldn’t have finished nearly as close had Miami not attempted a furious late-game comeback. The Heat had a 44-30 fourth quarter advantage, but it was too little too late.

Andrew Wiggins kept them in the game with his game-high 31 points, 6 rebounds, 4 assists and three steals on 10 of 15 shooting. He got some help offensively from Norman Powell, who added 28 points on another efficient outing.

However, both Tyler Herro and Bam Adebayo struggled. Herro managed to finish strong with 24 points, but he started the game 1 for 10 shooting. His first half inefficiency led to the Heat’s poor start— putting them in a hole that was too big to climb out of. Adebayo finished with a 15 and 10 double-double but only attempted nine shots on the night. Miami has to find a way to get him more aggressive with his attempts now that Herro is back in the fold.

Among even bigger problems, Nikola Jovic once again looked unplayable.

Jovic got an opportunity amid Jaime Jaquez Jr. being sidelined with a groin injury, but finished with just 2 points and five turnovers in 10 minutes off the bench. There was one sequence specifically that had Jovic cough up back-to-back embarrassing turnovers in the span of 10 seconds— which killed momentum for another mini comeback for the Heat earlier in the second half. His nightmare start to the season has continued, and negative impact performance like this is only going to stash him deeper out of coach Erik Spoelstra’s rotation entirely again.

Miami is 0-4 against Detroit in their last four matchups, with all games being decided by three points or less.

And with the Pistons resurgence to the top of the East this season, the Heat will have to address these matchups against them if they want to breakthrough as a true top team in the conference. Miami will regroup to hopefully bounce back against the visiting LA Clippers on Monday.

Heat’s late comeback attempt falls short to the Pistons, lose 138-135

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