Match of true warriors lived last night at the FTX Arena. Miami, leader of the East, and Toronto, a team that has reacted after a bad start to the season, faced each other under the Florida sun to play what looked like an exciting match. So it was. Without anyone wanting to give their arm to twist, up to three overtimes were needed for the Raptors to claim victory by a tight 120-124.
The reality is that during the development of the game it seemed at times that the Canadians would win with less difficulties. In the second quarter they were up 14 points and in the third they stretched that lead to 16. It was not enough. The Heat pressed and in the last minute of the match they won 100-98; however, two free throws by Scottie Barnes with 2.9 seconds remaining forced the first of three overtimes.
History repeated itself two more times. First it was Gary Trent Jr. (Toronto’s top scorer with 33 points) who forced the second, and then Tyler Herro who led both teams to the third and final. Nick Nurse’s boys ended up being better in a clash that Pascal Siakam closed from the free throw line.
“We hung on out there and it was certainly a game that could have gone either way several times. We just keep hanging on, fighting and solving problems, “says the Toronto head coach.
The word resist comes in handy to define what the Raptors did. While his rival’s bench accumulated up to 131 minutes of play, his own remained at 37… That great difference meant that all Toronto starters were between Fred VanVleet’s 54 minutes (19 points and 8 assists) and 57 of Pascal Siakam (21 points and 13 rebounds). They played authentic minutes, and resisted.
Butler’s triple-double
Jimmy Butler had one of his best games of the season against Toronto. The star of the Heat went up to 37 points, 14 rebounds and 10 assists to sign a fantastic triple-double to which he added three steals and two rebounds. It was a great performance without reward, but it served to highlight the great moment of form in which he is. Beyond the numbers of his player, for Erik Spoelstra the best thing was the team’s reaction after three quarters with problems.
«It was a very competitive game with wild changes, back and forth, with emotion. It was going to take a lot of mental strength to be able to fight through a lot of frustrating moments like the ones we had in the first three quarters, but I think we responded. It was just a great basketball game in the fourth quarter and overtime.
The Heat also had a double-double of 14 points and 16 rebounds from Bam Adebayo, 17 points from Gabe Vincent and 13 from Tyler Herro off the bench. Despite the loss, they remain in first place in the Eastern Conference at 32-18.
(Photograph by Cole Burston/Getty Images)