two games in a row opening<\/a> with Powell, Herro, Bam Adebayo, Andrew Wiggins and Davion Mitchell in a smaller-ball lineup, even with Jarrett Allen back for the Cavaliers.<\/p>\n\u2013 Even while getting to a set lineup, Spoelstra said tweaks will be ongoing.<\/p>\n
\u2013 \u201cThe minutes,\u201d he said, \u201cwe\u2019ll figure that out as it goes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2013 Pelle Larsson was first off the Heat bench, entering for Herro with the Heat down 21-10.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Kel\u2019el Ware and Jaime Jaquez Jr. then entered in the Heat\u2019s second substitution.<\/p>\n
\u2013 With Kasparas Jakucionis for the second consecutive game rounding out the nine-man primary rotation.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Then, with the deficit reaching 19 in the second period, Spoelstra reached for Simone Fontecchio, who did not play Wednesday night.<\/p>\n
\u2013 Corresponding to the lineup put back in place has been a minutes reduction for Wiggins.<\/p>\n
\u2013 \u201cI think he feels great physically right now,\u201d Spoelstra said, \u201cand that\u2019s where we want him for this final stretch.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2013 But it also means Wiggins opening at power forward, guarding up in size.<\/p>\n
\u2013 \u201cIt\u2019s not a concern,\u201d Spoelstra said. \u201cHe\u2019s done that the majority of the season and over the course of the last several years.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2013 Indeed, it is a role Wiggins often has had to play while playing alongside Draymond Green with the Warriors, when Green was cast at center.<\/p>\n
\u2013 \u201cThat\u2019s why I think he\u2019s had one of the more underrated defensive years this year,\u201d Spoelstra said of Wiggins. \u201cHe\u2019s guarded one through five for us all season long.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2013 Spoelstra entered aware of the challenge of beating the same team in consecutive games.<\/p>\n
\u2013 \u201cIt\u2019s not easy to beat a team twice,\u201d he said, \u201cAnd we like that challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2013 It proved to be quite the challenge.<\/p>\n
\u2013 With little to like about it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CLEVELAND \u2014 Observations and other notes of interest from Friday night\u2019s 149-128 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers: \u2013…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":685055,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3772],"tags":[7,306,305,193,3846,165,189,3880,6,66],"class_list":{"0":"post-685054","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cleveland-cavaliers","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-cavaliers","10":"tag-cleveland","11":"tag-cleveland-cavaliers","12":"tag-clevelandcavaliers","13":"tag-latest-headlines","14":"tag-miami-heat","15":"tag-miami-heat-blog","16":"tag-nba","17":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116309565470754350","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685054","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=685054"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685054\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/685055"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=685054"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=685054"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=685054"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}