{"id":530825,"date":"2026-01-12T03:10:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-12T03:10:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/530825\/"},"modified":"2026-01-12T03:10:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-12T03:10:12","slug":"analysis-of-sunday-nights-miami-heat-oklahoma-city-thunder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/530825\/","title":{"rendered":"Analysis of Sunday night&#8217;s Miami Heat-Oklahoma City Thunder"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Observations and other notes of interest from Sunday night\u2019s 124-112 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder:<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 A night after <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sun-sentinel.com\/2026\/01\/10\/windermans-view-heat-whole-but-wholly-unacceptable-in-loss-to-pacers\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">having the entire primary rotation available<\/a> for just the fourth time this season \u2026 that number remained at four.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 This time it was Norman Powell out of the mix, sidelined by lower-back soreness.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Ironically, less than a day after Powell was talking about the importance of the team\u2019s core finally getting minutes together.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 And so, as midseason approaches this week, we still don\u2019t know about what works.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Even as we learn what doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 With Powell out, it had Pelle Larsson starting in his place, in an opening lineup rounded out by Bam Adebayo, Andrew Wiggins, Davion Mitchell and Tyler Herro.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 The Heat entered 0-1 with that lineup.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 For his part, Larsson was good.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Active and aggressive.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 The type of energy any team could use at this point of the season.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 No matter who is in or out, Larsson has to be in.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Herro had been on the injury report earlier in the day, listed with the toe contusion that had him out for 13 games, as well as a chest contusion sustained in Saturday\u2019s hideous loss in Indiana.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 He played through.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 With the Thunder attacking his defense.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Even with Powell out, the Heat played a second consecutive night with Kel\u2019el Ware in reserve.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 The question now, as it was before when Ware played off the bench, is how to maintain Ware\u2019s minutes while in a reserve role.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 An element that seemingly remains a work in progress for Erik Spoelstra.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Adebayo is now two appearances from his 600th Heat regular-season games.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 The Thunder opened with a lineup of\u00a0 Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Cason Wallace, Lu Dort, Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 A night after shooting 4 of 30 on 3-pointers in the loss to the Pacers, the Heat this time made their first four attempts from beyond the arc.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Spoelstra lost an early challenge for the second night in a row, this time on a foul called on Adebayo with 8:40 left in the opening period.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Jaime Jaquez Jr. was first off the Heat bench.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Ware and Dru Smith then followed together.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 A night after Smith was shuffled out of the rotation in Indiana until garbage time.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Nikola Jovic then made it nine deep for the Heat.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 With it another night when it seemed that Kasparas Jakucionis would be better served with time in the G League.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 With something to be said for consistent playing time at this stage of Jakucionis\u2019 development.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013\u00a0 Spoelstra before the game addressed the Heat\u2019s turnover issues a night earlier in Indiana.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 \u201cWe have to be sharp, on top of our game,\u201d he said. \u201cWe want to be aggressive and not fearful, but we do have to be mindful.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 And with that, the turnovers were back.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Spoelstra said video study was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sun-sentinel.com\/2026\/01\/10\/heat-dreadful-in-123-99-loss-to-dreadful-pacers-amid-rocky-road-trip\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">minimal from Saturday\u2019s game<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 \u201cThere wasn\u2019t a whole lot to take away from that in terms of positives,\u201d he said of the fiasco in Indiana.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 At the start of the season, the pregame talk before road games was of media from the opposing team asking about the Heat\u2019s pace.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Lately, it has been such media asking about adjustments the Heat have faced.<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 \u201cWe\u2019ve adjusted some things as the season goes on,\u201d Spoelstra said. \u201cI mean, you are always information gathering based on how teams are planning to do it. We want to face as many different strategies as possible. But we want to get to what we want to get to.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 Spoelstra added, \u201cAnd that\u2019s what this league is about: Can you get your identity more often regardless of what teams are doing to try to take you away from being more fully capable of it?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u2013 The game concluded the eighth of the Heat\u2019s 15 back-to-back sets, with the Heat falling to 5-3 on the second night of such pairings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Observations and other notes of interest from Sunday night\u2019s 124-112 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder: \u2013 A&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":530826,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3783],"tags":[7,165,189,3880,6,310,475,179,3966,3965,66,312],"class_list":{"0":"post-530825","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oklahoma-city-thunder","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-latest-headlines","10":"tag-miami-heat","11":"tag-miami-heat-blog","12":"tag-nba","13":"tag-oklahoma","14":"tag-oklahoma-city","15":"tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","16":"tag-oklahomacity","17":"tag-oklahomacitythunder","18":"tag-sports","19":"tag-thunder"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115879937721349696","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530825","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=530825"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530825\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/530826"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=530825"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=530825"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=530825"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}