How a strength turned into a weakness for Heat, and other takeaways from loss to Cavaliers

The Miami Heat has managed to overcome injury issues and a road-heavy early-season schedule to win more games than it has lost. But the Heat couldn’t overcome its turnover issues on Friday.

The Heat (12-10) committed 18 turnovers in a 111-99 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers (13-9) at Kaseya Center on Friday night. It marked the Heat’s fifth loss in the last seven games after a 10-5 start to the season.

Rare off nights for Jimmy Butler and Duncan Robinson didn’t help Miami. Butler finished with 16 points on 5-of-15 shooting from the field and Duncan Robinson scored a season-low one point while missing all six of his three-point attempts.

“First, you have to credit Cleveland,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said after the Heat’s sloppy night. “We were bobbling, missing dribbles, missing catches, careless with the ball right out of the gate even if we didn’t turn it over. And that kind of set the tone for the game.”

After the Heat built a 16-point lead with 8:58 left in the first half, the Cavaliers outscored the Heat 88-60 the rest of the way.

The defining stretch of the game came in the third quarter when the Cavaliers began the second half on a 13-0 run to extend a one-point halftime lead to a 14-point lead in just a few minutes. Cleveland outscored Miami 35-23 in the period behind 13 third-quarter points from Donovan Mitchell to enter the fourth ahead by 13.

The closest the Heat got in the fourth quarter was when it pulled within nine points multiple times in the final minutes.

Mitchell led the Cavaliers with a game-high 27 points to go with 13 rebounds and six assists.

Six Heat players finished with double-digit points led by 17 points from Kyle Lowry.

Five takeaways from the Heat’s loss to the Cavaliers on Friday:

The Heat’s offense was sloppy.

The Heat’s offense has been trending in a positive direction recently. Miami entered with the NBA’s sixth-best offensive rating in the last 10 games, scoring 120.5 points per 100 possessions during that stretch.

But that positive trend ended Friday, when the Heat posted an ugly offensive rating of 99 points scored per 100 possessions. It’s tied for Miami’s second-worst single game offensive rating of the season, falling to 0-6 this season when posting an offensive rating of fewer than 105 points per 100 possessions.

“There were turnovers, there were missed dribbled, missed things that take you out of your rhythm,” Spoelstra said. “All those things add up and they matter. You have to be sharp and you have to fundamental, in tune with each other. Not take that stuff for granted. Great rhythm can be fleeting. We’ve been in a great rhythm offensively for several weeks now and you can’t just rely on that, and we know that.”

All the mistakes helped the Cavaliers outscore the Heat 22-12 in points off turnovers and 23-11 in transition.

It was an uncharacteristic performance from the Heat, which has been among the NBA’s best at limiting turnovers. Miami entered Friday with the league’s sixth-lowest turnover percentage (percentage of plays that end in a team’s turnover) at 13 percent.

Even after a rough first half that included nine turnovers, the Heat’s sloppiest stretch came in the third quarter.

The Heat committed seven turnovers in the third quarter, helping fuel a Cavaliers offense that scored 35 points on 57.1 percent shooting from the field and 7-of-11 (63.6 percent) shooting on threes in the period. Cleveland totaled nine points off turnovers and seven fast-break points in the period.

That allowed Cleveland to turn a one-point halftime lead into a 13-point lead at the end of the third quarter.

Duncan Robinson committed a team-high six turnovers for the Heat. Lowry and Jaime Jaquez Jr. each finished with three turnovers.

It should be noted that Cleveland features one of the NBA’s top defenses. The Cavaliers, which own the league’s eighth-best defensive rating this season, also mixed up coverages from switching to zone and other schemes to keep the Heat’s offense off balance.

“Tonight was an aberration probably for us. I don’t think it’s going to happen often,” Lowry said of the Heat’s high-turnover outing. “I think they forced us into some turnovers, they mixed up their coverages. They went small, they were showing and switching, and just kind of doing things differently. But it’s a good game for us to learn long term.”

The Heat is 2-4 this season when committing more turnovers than its opponent.

“I thought there were some decent things defensively throughout the course of the game,” Spoelstra said. “But not even scoring 100 points, granted they’re a good defense, but that’s not going to get it done.”

Both teams were missing multiple rotation players.

The Heat remained without Bam Adebayo (left hip contusion), Tyler Herro (right ankle sprain), Haywood Highsmith (lower back contusion) and Dru Smith (right ACL injury).

That long injury list includes three members of the Heat’s preferred starting lineup: Adebayo, Herro and Highsmith.

With injuries depleting the Heat’s depth, Spoelstra went with a short eight-man rotation on Friday. Thomas Bryant, Jamal Cain, Nikola Jovic and Cole Swider were available for Miami, but did not play.

Meanwhile, the Cavaliers played without Emoni Bates (G League), Ty Jerome (right ankle sprain), Caris LeVert (left knee injury management), Evan Mobley (left knee soreness) and Ricky Rubio (not with the team).

The Cavaliers’ absences included two rotation players: LeVert and Mobley.

LeVert is Cleveland’s leading bench scorer, averaging 14.9 points per game this season. Mobley is a fixture in Cleveland’s starting lineup, averaging 16 points, 10.5 rebounds, 2.9 assists and 1.7 blocks per game this season.

Then Orlando Robinson ran into early foul trouble, further testing the Heat’s frontcourt depth.

Orlando Robinson made his third straight start at center for the injured Adebayo. He recorded the first double-double of his NBA career in Wednesday’s win in Toronto, but dealt with early foul trouble on Friday.

Orlando Robinson was called for his second foul of Friday’s game with 7:11 left in the first quarter, forcing Kevin Love to enter the game off the bench earlier than usual.

But Love was up for the task, scoring zero points but totaling seven rebounds, three assists, two steals, one block and a drawn charge while playing the final 7:11 of the opening period. The Heat outscored the Cavaliers by 10 points during that stretch.

Orlando Robinson then showed discipline, playing 7:45 in the second quarter without being called for his third foul. In fact, he wasn’t called for another foul the rest of the game.

Orlando Robinson ended the night with five points, eight rebounds and three assists in 20 minutes.

Love was a force off the bench, contributing 14 points, 12 rebounds, three assists, one steal and one block in 28 minutes.

The Heat was outscored by 18 points in Orlando Robinson’s minutes, but actually outscored the Cavaliers by six points with Love on the court. Love was one of the lone bright spots for the Heat in Friday’s loss.

The Cavaliers had to overcome their own foul trouble to win.

Cavaliers starting guard Darius Garland, who entered as Cleveland’s second-leading scorer with 19.7 points per game, played just six first-half minutes because of foul trouble.

Garland was called for his third foul with 6:39 left in the first quarter and spent the rest of the period on the bench.

Garland then re-entered the game at the start of the second quarter, but picked up his fourth foul just 20 seconds in the period. He spent the rest of the first half on the bench.

This threw the Cavaliers’ rotation out of whack, forcing Sam Merrill and Craig Porter Jr. to play extended minutes in the first half.

But Garland was able to play 20 minutes in the second half, avoiding a fourth foul the rest of the way. Garland scored 14 of his 18 points and dished out five assists in the second half.

Max Strus played an NBA game in Miami for the first time since last season’s NBA Finals.

Strus, who left the Heat this past offseason to sign with the Cavaliers in free agency, closed his first game back in Miami since his departure with 11 points on 4-of-17 shooting from the field and 2-of-11 shooting on threes, seven rebounds and one assist on Friday. His pregame introduction was met with a warm ovation from the Miami crowd.

It marked the second game that Strus has played against the Heat this season, the first coming when the Heat routed the Cavaliers 129-96 on Nov. 22 in Cleveland.

Strus, who developed into one of Miami’s undrafted success stories, spent three seasons with the Heat before joining the Cavaliers this past summer. He started in each of the 23 games during the Heat’s playoff run to the NBA Finals last season.

“We really enjoyed our time with Max and his family,” Spoelstra said before Friday’s game. “We got to know his family really well and it was just a special time.”

Strus, 27, went undrafted out of DePaul in 2019 before earning a two-way contract from the Heat in the 2020 offseason and then being promoted to the Heat’s 15-man roster in the 2021 offseason. Along the way, Strus established himself as a quality NBA three-point shooter who also developed other areas of his game.

While Strus wanted to return to the Heat in free agency, there was no realistic path for him to stay in Miami with the Heat entering free agency already well above the luxury-tax threshold. Strus ended up signing a four-year contract worth $62.3 million with the Cavaliers.

Strus is averaging career-highs in points (14.3 per game), rebounds (5.5), assists (4) and minutes (35) with the Cavaliers this season.