With the necessary pieces to slow down the MVP and a high-ceiling offense with plenty of shooting, the Miami Heat are the Bucks threat few consider.
The Miami Heat showed why their ability to knock off the league-leading Milwaukee Bucks in a potential playoff series is very legitimate in the first half of last Thursday’s game.
The league-leader in 3-point efficiency knocked down 13 triples across the first 24 minutes. The team that ranks fifth in assists per game handed out 19 dimes. A surplus of rugged perimeter defenders forced three turnovers from Giannis Antetokounmpo, who was a minus-13 in over 17 minutes of action.
Even without Jimmy Butler, Miami went into the half up 17. The Bucks flipped a second-half switch great teams tend to have in their back pocket, engineering a 31-point turnaround to win 130-116. But the Heat’s first-half efforts further emphasized what wins in their previous two matchups with the Bucks have told us: If any team is capable of upsetting Milwaukee, they need to be in that conversation as much as Toronto or Boston.
Despite housing two All-Stars, the Heat play like a collective unit that doesn’t. We see it in how their offense operates, where off-ball motion is key. They’re tops in cuts per game as a team, and it’s no coincidence they cover the sixth-most ground at the offensive end.
Player movement creates open looks, and Miami has a roster that capitalizes on them no matter the recipient, with seven players averaging double figures.
Milwaukee got an early taste of that balanced attack back on Oct. 26 in the second game of the season for both teams. Butler didn’t play, but the Heat still took home an overtime road victory thanks to seven double-digit scorers, six of whom put up at least 14.
When all five guys on the court are threats to score, it creates the type of havoc even the Bucks’ top-ranked defense could have trouble chasing around.
Compounded with the struggles of stopping an everybody-eats offense is the personnel within it. Miami is ninth in 3-point attempts per game and converts them at a higher clip than any team thanks to seven players shooting north of 35.0 percent.
Duncan Robinson has been one of the breakouts of this season, canning 44.8 percent of his 8.3 3-point attempts per game. Rather than spot-up and wait for the ball, he hunts threes off hand-offs, generating the most points per possession in such plays and it’s not even close.
The attention he commands with the ball in his hands and feet beyond the arc opens things for Bam Adebayo. The Heat run plenty of their offense through Adebayo, including hand-offs with Robinson. It’s how the first-time All-Star ranks second in cuts per game, diving after his defender is forced to step up on one of the game’s premier snipers.
Put Bam and his career-high 5.1 assists per game in a four-on-three situation and Miami’s floor spacing and overall unselfishness become an even deadlier combination. Milwaukee’s length gives it a better shot than most, but they’ve given over 115 points in two of their three meetings, so the results hardly breed encouragement.
Antetokounmpo’s season-low in points is 13, having been reached twice this season. Once was against the Sacramento Kings. The other came in early March in the Bucks second loss to the Heat.
Butler, Jae Crowder and Andre Iguodala comprise a trio of smart, tenacious and well-built wing defenders, the interchangeable type every team covets for versatility purposes. Their prowess can be shown through the lens of Khris Middleton, on the cusp of a 50-40-90 yet who shot a combined 11-of-32 from the field in his first two encounters with the Heat.
Slowing a player like the Greek Freak, however, takes a player of similar physical marvel. At 6’10” with quick feet and a 7’3” wingspan, Adebayo has contested 28 of Antetokounmpo’s shots in their three battles, tied with Joel Embiid for the most among any other player.
The reigning MVP has converted 12 of those attempts, drawing only two fouls in the process. That’s a 42.9 percent clip that comes in significantly lower than his season field goal percentage of 55.4 percent.
Giannis is the root from which all of Milwaukee’s fruit grows, producing incredible efficiency around the rim and 3-pointers at ever turn. There’s no stopping him, but slowing the Bucks at the source is the best route to victory.
Only so many teams possess the personnel to do so. Even fewer can combine it with the necessary offensive firepower.
Miami has perhaps the singular best option to throw at Antetokounmpo along with plenty of others to rotate through over the course of a seven-game series. Going against the Bucks means facing the team surrendering the most 3-point makes and attempts per game, a quality the Heat’s bevy of ball movement and outside shooting would be primed to exploit.
If all else fails, Butler has earned a reputation as a reliable fail-safe, ranking inside the 68th percentile for isolation scorers — above Antetokounmpo, Russell Westbrook and LeBron James — with a penchant for late-game heroics.
The Heat are 4-2 against the east’s top two teams (Milwaukee and Toronto) and took their most recent battle against Boston without Butler. What they lack in record compared to those three is made up for in a ceiling none of them would like to tempt in a playoff series.
As the seeding would have it, Miami and Milwaukee are slated to meet in the second round. The absence of homecourt works in the Heat’s favor and they’ve got plenty else at both ends to shake up the postseason picture out east.