On the night when the Miami Heat retired longtime captain Udonis Haslem’s jersey, they fell to the Atlanta Hawks,
109-108, and it was a bittersweet Friday for the team sans Trae Young. When the game came down to the last two
seconds, Miami was trailing one point. Star Jimmy Butler had possession of the ball, but he decided to give it to
Caleb Martin, who was unable to make a shot in time.
To put things in perspective, Butler saw an open guy as he was sprinting to the right corner to retrieve the ball, but
Martin paused and lost time. Butler accepted responsibility for the incident in his press conference to the media,
even though Martin was clearly at fault and might have been held accountable. Butler claimed he should have shot
the ball.
Butler admitted, “To be brutally honest, I guess I could have shot it, but I probably should have.” I passed the ball to
Caleb because it seemed like I saw him take a step toward me to come double. Since I should have taken and made
the shot, I believe I put him in a bad situation.
Erik Spoelstra, the head coach of the Heat, expressed regret to the media after the game that determined its
outcome. He even goes so far as to refer to it as a “poor play call,” saying he regrets making it.
“It was one of those plays where, in my mind, we would have an advantage in that quarter, but that wasn’t how it
worked out,” Spoelstra remarked. “I wanted to check if he could gain some room and surpass it.” That play call was
awful. I regret the decision I made on that. I was thinking of something different.
With less than three minutes remaining, the Hawks embarked on an 8-0 run to take a four-point lead. Butler, who
led the team with 25 points, was a major factor in the team’s comeback. The 34-year-old great would go on to score
five baskets in a row, setting up points for teammates Tyler Herro and Bam Adebayo, among others.
The Heat would have been up two at this moment, so the Hawks needed to make a crucial basket. In Young’s
absence, Atlanta’s star player, Dejounte Murray, scored a decisive three-pointer to give them a lead against Miami
and set up the team’s careless last possession.
It is rather amusing because Murray is said to be in negotiations for a trade, with the Heat being one of the teams
cited. After the defeat by the losing team for the second time in a row, Spoelstra described the shot he took to the
media as “very tough.”
Spoelstra stated, “He hit an extremely tough shot.” At midcourt, Jacob [Martin]
grabbed him up and attempted to level him off. A time out would have been
appropriate before Herro’s miss. “There were four or five seconds left on the clock
to get organized. That could appear slightly differently if four seconds are cut off.
It’s possible that Murray’s shot is rushed a bit more.
