Adebayo’s game-winner, defense dominates, other takeaways from short-handed Heat’s win over Magic

It was ugly, but the Miami Heat won. That’s all that matters, especially when missing three usual starters.

The Heat (22-16) needed to overcome ongoing injury issues, uneven three-point shooting and some sloppy turnovers on its way to escaping with a 99-96 victory over the Orlando Magic (21-17) on Friday night at Kaseya Center.

“This was a game that you just knew in the first quarter that it was going to be back and forth,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “You just had a feeling that neither team would be able to create any kind of separation. They defend very well and we came into this game with the intention to defend much better than we did the other night.”

While missing starters Jimmy Butler, Tyler Herro and Kyle Lowry because of injuries, the Heat relied on its defense, the excellence of Bam Adebayo and the shot-making of Duncan Robinson and Jaime Jaquez Jr. to get past the Magic.

It was a close game throughout, but it appeared the Heat was starting to pull away when it went ahead by six points with 4:17 left in the fourth quarter. That’s when the Magic went on a 10-3 run to rally and take a one-point lead with 38.3 seconds to play.

But Adebayo made sure the Heat went home with the win, hitting a 13-foot jumper from just above the free-throw line to put Miami back ahead by one point with 18.8 seconds left.

“Bam, we ran a lot of actions through him down the stretch and he hit the big one to give us the lead,” Spoelstra said.

On the next possession, Magic star Paolo Banchero drove to his right and missed a nine-foot jumper. Banchero grabbed the offensive rebound, but blew what appeared to be a clean layup as the ball slipped out of his hands with 8.5 seconds remaining.

Heat forward Haywood Highsmith grabbed the defensive rebound and the Magic was forced to intentionally foul Highsmith to prevent time from running out. Highsmith hit both free throws to push the Heat’s lead to three points with 7.8 seconds to play.

With no timeouts left, Banchero rushed a 29-foot three-point shot that bounced off the rim as time expired to end the Magic’s hopes of coming away with the win.

Along with sinking the game-winner, Adebayo finished with 21 points, 11 rebounds and seven assists. He closed the three-point victory with a team-best plus/minus of plus-17.

“I felt like he had a triple-double, so that’s why I asked the staff right after the game, ‘Did he have a triple-double?’” Spoelstra said of Adebayo. “Because his play-making was elite and essential. I don’t think we would have generated enough points in this game if he didn’t really help create some advantages with his vision and his passing and doing it from those different regions.”

Also for the Heat, Robinson scored a team-high 23 points and Jaquez added 19 points, seven rebounds and three assists.

The Magic entered with a top-five defensive rating this season and shined on that end of the court. But Orlando’s offense struggled to generate efficient offense against Miami.

The Heat’s defense limited the Magic to 96 points on 43.9 percent shooting from the field and 12-of-40 (30 percent) shooting on threes.

Banchero finished with a game-high 25 points for Orlando, to go with eight rebounds and six assists. But Banchero shot just 10 of 26 (38.5 percent) from the field and 1 of 7 (14.3 percent) on threes, as the Heat sent extra defenders his way whenever he approached the paint.

The Heat allowed 104.3 points per 100 possessions on Friday for its sixth-best single-game defensive rating of the season.

That defensive effort helped the Heat win despite committing 17 turnovers and shooting just 8 of 26 (30.8 percent) from three-point range.

“We had to win it ugly,” Adebayo said. “We have to win games like that. They’re a part of the season. We have a long season.”

Next up for the Heat is a matchup against the Charlotte Hornets on Sunday at Kaseya Center to close its four-game homestand. The Heat is 2-1 on the homestand.

Here are five takeaways from the Heat’s win over the Magic on Friday:

The Heat’s injury issues continued, but the Magic was also missing key players.

The Heat was without three members of its preferred starting lineup on Friday, with Butler (right toe MP joint sprain), Herro (right shoulder strain) and Lowry (left hand sprain) unavailable.

It marked the sixth straight game that Butler has missed and the second straight game that Lowry has missed with their respective injuries.

But it was the first game that Herro has missed with his shoulder injury after scoring 17 points on 7-of-21 shooting from the field in 37 minutes in Wednesday’s loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder. Herro sat out 18 straight games earlier this season because of a sprained ankle.

Before Friday’s game, Spoelstra said Herro suffered the injury when he “jammed” it during Wednesday’s defeat.

The good news is Butler is expected back in the coming days, with his return likely coming on Sunday against the visiting Hornets or on Monday on the road against the Brooklyn Nets. The expectation is Butler will play in one of those games during the upcoming back-to-back, but not both games.

Along with missing Butler, Herro and Lowry, the Heat was also without Dru Smith (season-ending knee surgery) and Cole Swider (G League).

This forced some on the Heat’s roster to play heavy minutes on Friday, as Adebayo logged 39 minutes, Robinson logged 41 minutes and Jaquez logged 37 minutes.

Meanwhile, the Magic was without two usual starters on Friday, with Wendell Carter Jr. (right knee tendinitis) and Franz Wagner (right ankle sprain) ruled out. Rotation regulars Gary Harris (right calf strain) and Jonathan Isaac (illness) also did not play.

However, the Heat did get one player back from injury, as Caleb Martin made his return.

It marked Martin’s game action in nearly three weeks since turning his right ankle during the Heat’s home win over the Philadelphia 76ers on Christmas Day.

After missing seven straight games, Martin totaled 11 points on 3-of-6 shooting from the field and 1-of-2 shooting on threes, four rebounds and two assists in 24 minutes off the bench in his return.

“I didn’t want to come in and try to do too much,” Martin said. “I didn’t want to try to worry about my rhythm or anything like that. I just wanted to feel the game out and let the game come to me, and that’s exactly what happened.”

Martin entered Friday’s game for the first time with 3:26 left in the opening quarter and immediately made a positive play, assisting on an and-one Kevin Love layup on his first touch of the game.

Martin was so effective on both ends that Spoelstra kept him on the court for the entire fourth quarter in his first game back. He scored seven points during the final period.

“It’s hard to actually explain it, you just feel it when he’s out there,” Spoelstra said when asked how Martin’s return will help the Heat. “It’s the quick twitch, that speed and quickness. And he fills in a lot of those X-factor gaps that I talk about that lead to winning. I know how badly he’s wanted to get back out there, particularly these last few days. So it’s good to see him in a better mood.”

The injuries led the Heat to use another new starting lineup.

The Heat opened Friday’s game with a lineup of Jaquez, Robinson, Highsmith, Nikola Jovic and Adebayo.

It marked the Heat’s 21st different starting lineup in the first 38 games. The Dallas Mavericks are the only team in the NBA that has used more different starting lineups (22) than the Heat this season.

Not only was it a new starting lineup for the Heat, but it was also a lineup that had yet to play together this season.

For Jovic, it marked his seventh straight start after spending most of the season out of the Heat’s rotation. With the team’s injuries lifting Jovic into a bigger role, he has flashed both his growth and potential during this stretch.

But Friday was not Jovic’s best performance. The 20-year-old finished the win with four points on 1-of-8 shooting from the field and 1-of-4 shooting from three-point range, three rebounds and four assists in 25 minutes.

The Heat’s dominance over the Magic continued, but this was a grind-it-out win.

Friday’s victory marked the Heat’s eighth straight home win over the Magic, a winning streak that dates back to January 2020. That’s the longest such streak over the Magic in Heat history.

The Heat has also won 13 of its last 16 matchups, home and away, against the Magic.

But Friday marked just the second time since the 2015-16 season that the Heat and Magic played a game when neither team hit the 100-point mark. Friday actually marked just the 13th NBA game this season that both teams scored fewer than 100 points in.

“This is a throwback Miami Heat game, probably a throwback Miami-Orlando type game,” Spoelstra said. “In the last 24 hours, Pat [Riley] mentioned that a few times. It’s OK to keep the score down and defend, and then find a way to win at the end. We were able to do that. I thought it was fitting that we were able to seal it with a defensive stop. That part was encouraging to see.”

The Heat’s schedule softens a bit now.

Friday marked the end of a tough 12-stretch for the Heat that included seven games against teams that entered Friday with a winning record. Miami went 7-5 during that span.

Next up is a soft spot in the Heat’s schedule, with five of the next six games come against teams that entered Friday with a losing record. It begins Sunday against the struggling Hornets.

This season, the Heat is 8-11 against teams that entered Friday with a winning record and 14-5 against teams that entered Friday with a losing record.