South Florida could have been the epic epicenter of sports Saturday. There was a moment to dream, too.

The Miami Heat led early in their playoff game, the Panthers took 1-0 lead a few minutes later in theirs and the Dolphins were a focus of the NFL draft’s third day with seven picks.

We were living so well that moment in so many places.

And then it all crashed on us like a bad joke.

• The Heat were trounced by top seed Cleveland, 124-87, in Miami to fall behind 3-0 in their series.

• The Panthers lost their way in losing 5-1 to Tampa Bay and had their series lead trimmed to 2-1.

• The Dolphins might have found some important pieces, but their Saturday had all the excitement on a rummage sale when, after trading out of the third round on Friday, they traded out of the fourth round Saturday and declined to take a fifth-round flyer on bargain-bin quarterback Shedeur Sanders.

All in all, a day of dreaming became a terrible, horrible, very bad, no good day that might look even worse Sunday.

The Panthers’ Matthew Tkachuk made a late, loud hit on Tampa Bay center Jake Guentzel that the NHL probably will review for further discipline beyond the assessed five-minute penalty.

Tkachuk’s hit wasn’t the violent, head-hunting smackdown on Panthers center Aleksander Barkov in Game 2 that led to Tampa Bay’s Brandon Hagel was suspended for Saturday. Or was it?

“I think it’s extremely similar other than the puck wasn’t touched (by Barkov),’’ TNT studio analyst Paul Bissonnette said in the post-game.

“That’s a big difference,’’ analyst Anson Carter said.

Guentzel did touch the puck but it was long gone when Tkachuk hit him. The NHL will rule on that Sunday, and the debate will consume the hockey world until Game 4 in Sunrise on Monday night. The decision could tilt that night, and with it the series, though Tampa Bay did just fine without Hagel’s talent on Saturday.

“The only players we hit are the ones with pucks,’’ Tampa Bay coach Jon Cooper said in repeating Panthers coach Paul Maurice’s line after the Hagel hit.

The Panthers remain the only chance for a championship parade in South Florida and another champagne morning at the Elbo Room on Fort Lauderdale beach like last summer.

But Saturday showed how difficult that road will be, right from this first series. Tampa Bay has championship pedigree, just as the Panthers. They didn’t fold and scored five straight goals after Tkachuk scored the game-opening goal.

“I’m not feeling like (Saturday) was an aberration to how I thought this would go,’’ Maurice said. “It’s going to be a grinder straight through.”

As for the Heat, the common thought is the series is over after Cleveland outclassed them for a third straight game.

If only that were true.

There’s one more Cleveland win to play out, which means the chance things can get uglier than Saturday. The Heat continued to show their season highlight was winning the two play-in games just to reach the playoffs after Jimmy Butler’s exit wrecked the season.

After taking a 15-6 lead, the Heat didn’t compete Saturday. The signature sequence of the game was the Heat throwing up consecutive air balls before half and Cleveland scoring an easy basket inside for a 62-42 lead.

“We laid an egg today,’’ Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said.

No NBA team has rallied to win a series from a 3-0 playoff deficit. That about sums up the Heat’s chances.

“We’re going to play until the final buzzer, whether that’s next game, Game 5, 6 7 or another series after this,’’ guard Tyler Herro said. “We just got to keep playing. That’s what we’re paid to do and that’s who we are as an organization.”

The good news: Team president Pat Riley can start whale hunting in one more game to replace Butler.

As for the Dolphins, everyone knows the draft is about tomorrow. But their big move Saturday was to trade a fourth-round pick in part for a later pick Saturday and a 2026 third-round pick.

Maybe this under-fire management team did what’s best for the franchise. Maybe this needy roster could have got added help for this season. Maybe it’s just best to say as little as possible about third days of drafts.

The one chance for marquee interest with a late-round pick was to take Sanders, the free-fallin’ Colorado quarterback. The Dolphins kicked off their Saturday by taking Maryland tackle Jordan Phillips with the sixth pick of the fifth round. Cleveland took Sanders with the following pick.

All in all, a Saturday that could have been epic instead fizzled as the afternoon played out. The Heat lost. The Panthers lost. The Dolphins had a typically ignorable third day of the draft.

And the bad day’s not done, as Tkachuk’s hit plays out Sunday.

Originally Published: April 26, 2025 at 5:50 PM EDT