Injury-depleted Heat come up short in overtime loss to Wizards. Takeaways and details

The Miami Heat did not have Bam Adebayo, Jimmy Butler or Tyler Herro for Friday’s game against the Washington Wizards. But the Heat still had enough to force overtime.

They just didn’t have enough to escape with the win, as the Wizards won the extra period 3-2 to earn a 107-106 victory over the injury-depleted Heat on Friday night at Capital One Arena. The Heat fell to 0-2 on its four-game trip.

Miami played with just seven available players: Kyle Lowry, Caleb Martin, Haywood Highsmith, Nikola Jovic, Max Strus, Jamal Cain and Orlando Robinson.

Despite its long injury list that included nine players, the Heat led for nearly the entire game but the Wizards rallied from a double-digit third-quarter deficit to force overtime.

The Heat led by as many as 15 points in the first half and entered halftime ahead by 12 points. That’s when fatigue seemed to set in for Miami’s undermanned roster as the game went on.

The Wizards used an 18-3 run to turn a 13-point deficit into a two-point lead over the Heat with 10:31 left in the fourth quarter.

The Heat and Wizards then traded punches for most of the final period, with the two teams tied at 99 with with 1:49 remaining in the period.

The Heat scored the next five points to pull ahead by five with 1:01 left.

But the Wizards answered with a quick Bradley Beal layup to cut the deficit to three with 54.8 seconds left. Then Wizards forward Kyle Kuzma hit a corner three-pointer in front of the Heat’s bench to tie the game with 15.3 seconds remaining in regulation and force overtime.

Despite missing its first seven shots of overtime, the Heat still found itself with an opportunity to escape with the win with possession of the ball and trailing by one point with 2.8 seconds left in the extra period.

But on the final possession out of a timeout, Strus missed a decent three-point look as the final buzzer sounded to end the Heat’s hopes for the improbable victory.

With so many players out, most of the Heat’s available players had to log big minutes.

Lowry logged 51 minutes. He earned his 21st NBA triple-double in the process with 24 points, 10 rebounds and 15 assists.

The Heat continues its four-game trip on Sunday against the Cleveland Cavaliers before wrapping up the trip on Monday against the Minnesota Timberwolves.

Five takeaways from the Heat’s loss on Friday:

The Heat actually had just seven available players for Friday’s game, one below the NBA-required minimum of eight active needed to play a game.

But the Heat made injured guard Gabe Vincent active to meet the league’s requirement to get the game in. Vincent was in uniform but was not able to play because of left knee effusion.

The Heat was also without Bam Adebayo (left knee contusion), Jimmy Butler (right knee soreness), Dewayne Dedmon (non-COVID illness), Udonis Haslem (personal reasons), Tyler Herro (left ankle sprain), Victor Oladipo (left knee tendinosis), Duncan Robinson (right hand sprain), Gabe Vincent (left knee effusion) and Omer Yurtseven (left ankle surgery).

Adebayo, Haslem, Herro, Oladipo and Yurtseven also missed Wednesday’s loss to the Toronto Raptors. In fact, Herro has missed six straight games and Oladipo and Yurtseven have yet to play this season.

But Butler, Dedmon, Robinson and Vincent were new Heat absences.

Butler is expected to return to Miami on Saturday to have his knee further evaluated, according to a league source, which means he’ll miss the rest of the trip and the soonest he can return is when the Heat returns home to host the Wizards on Wednesday. The hope remains that Butler’s knee issue is minor.

Dedmon has been playing through a case of plantar fasciitis, but the ailment keeping out of Friday’s game was listed as a non-COVID stomach illness.

Robinson got one of his fingers caught in another player’s jersey during the team’s morning shootaround Friday and hurt his hand.

“He would really like to be out there tonight,” Spoelstra said of Robinson. “It’s just one of those freakish things. He got his finger caught in a jersey and we’ll just continue to treat him and see how he feels.”

Vincent also took part in the team’s morning shootaround on Friday, but his knee swelled up in the hours before the game.

“After last game his knee was a little bit sore,” Spoelstra said of Vincent. “I’m sure it’s just the uptick in minutes and mode and everything. And that’s where yo have to treat each player’s circumstance separately. Because he’s got that kind of feeling, he’s seeing other guys out, ‘Hey, I have to go play.’ But we want to be responsible to each player. We think it’s the best decision for him not to go tonight.”

Fatigue seemed to set in for the short-handed Heat during the second half.

After shooting 9 of 20 (45 percent) from three-point range in the first two quarters to enter halftime with a 12-point lead, the Heat struggled to make threes the rest of the way. Miami shot just 2 of 23 (8.7 percent) from beyond the arc after halftime.

Miami also shot an inefficient 13 of 51 (25.5 percent) from the field in the final two quarters and overtime.

With Adebayo, Butler and Herro out and no backup point guard available, Lowry did everything he could to try to lead the Heat to the win.

Lowry, 36, finished with 24 points, 10 rebounds and 15 assists in 51 minutes to earn the 21st triple-double of his NBA career.

Lowry did not get the chance to rest much, as he exited the game for the first time with 1:10 left in the third quarter.

The performance represented Lowry’s third triple-double as a member of the Heat. He picked up two triple-doubles in his first season with Miami last season.

Lowry nearly had a triple-double by halftime, recording 14 points, seven rebounds and nine assists in the first two quarters. He played every second of the first half.

The last time a Heat player played all 24 minutes of the first half was the final game of the 2014-15 season against the Philadelphia 76ers on April 15, 2015, when four players did it: Michael Beasley, James Ennis, Tyler Johnson, and Henry Walker.

With so many players out, the Heat played three rookies. Two of them were undrafted and one of them made his NBA debut.

Nikola Jovic, who was selected with the 27th pick in this past summer’s draft, started at center in place of Adebayo for the second straight game. Jovic finished Friday’s loss with 18 points and six rebounds in 30 minutes.

The Heat’s two two-way contract players, Jamal Cain and Orlando Robinson, both went undrafted this year. Because of the Heat’s injury-depleted roster, they each set a new NBA career-high in minutes on Friday.

Cain finished with four points and six rebounds in 18 minutes in his third game action of the season.

Robinson made his NBA debut against the Wizards and was impressive, finishing with 14 points and seven rebounds in 32 minutes.

Friday marked the first game in Robinson’s NBA career that he missed because of an injury.

In Robinson’s first NBA season in 2018-19, he spent most it with Heat’s G League affiliate. The 29 games he did not appear in while with the Heat were all listed as did not play-coach’s decision.

In Robinson’s second NBA season in 2019-20, he did not miss a game.

In Robinson’s third NBA season in 2020-21, he also did not miss a game.

Last season, Robinson missed three games in the regular season because of the NBA’s health and safety protocols and received five DNP-CDs in the playoffs.

And Friday was the first game Robinson missed this season and the first game he has missed in his NBA career because of an injury. It came because of a “freakish” incident during Friday’s morning shootaround.