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Star-less Heat still too good for Raptors
Source: Agencies |
April 15, 2011, Friday
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THE Miami Heat completed their regular season with a confident 97-79 win over the Toronto Raptors on Wednesday, the star-studded lineup now able to shift their focus to a tilt at the NBA championship.
Having already locked up the second seed in the East and a first round matchup with the Philadelphia 76ers, the Heat rested All-Star trio LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh for the regular season finale and still ran out comfortable winners.
After enduring a campaign of unrelenting scrutiny, the Heat now face a completely new set of questions. The spotlight becoming brighter and the attention more intense.
The Heat have had 82 games to learn to play together and their first round series against the energetic 76ers should reveal if those lessons have sunk in.
"I think we have squeezed everything you possibly could out of the regular season and I think it has prepared us for the post-season," Heat coach Erik Spoelstra told reporters. "What I've been talking about the last few weeks are habits.
"If you haven't developed habits over the five months of the regular season and been building up resiliency and the resolve to get you through tough time; you're not going to try to do it in a day and a half."
From the day in July when 'King James' jilted the Cleveland Cavaliers and took his talents to South Beach to form an NBA super team with Bosh and Wade, Miami has been planning a championship parade.
A regular season record of 58-24 was the first step towards their objective but now the climb becomes steeper with four testing best-of-seven series needing to be navigated to the summit.
"Our objective is winning, you can see it by our actions and the Big Three's actions," Heat centre Jamaal Magloire told reporters.
"We're ready, we're looking forward to playing Philadelphia, we've played hard the whole season... we've given ourselves an opportunity to go all the way."
In Chicago, Kyle Korver scored 19 points and Derrick Rose had 15 as the Bulls grabbed their ninth straight win, beating the New Jersey Nets 97-92.
In Phoenix, Marcin Gortat had 21 points as Phoenix denied San Antonio a chance for home-court advantage throughout the playoffs with a 106-103 win.
Having already locked up the second seed in the East and a first round matchup with the Philadelphia 76ers, the Heat rested All-Star trio LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh for the regular season finale and still ran out comfortable winners.
After enduring a campaign of unrelenting scrutiny, the Heat now face a completely new set of questions. The spotlight becoming brighter and the attention more intense.
The Heat have had 82 games to learn to play together and their first round series against the energetic 76ers should reveal if those lessons have sunk in.
"I think we have squeezed everything you possibly could out of the regular season and I think it has prepared us for the post-season," Heat coach Erik Spoelstra told reporters. "What I've been talking about the last few weeks are habits.
"If you haven't developed habits over the five months of the regular season and been building up resiliency and the resolve to get you through tough time; you're not going to try to do it in a day and a half."
From the day in July when 'King James' jilted the Cleveland Cavaliers and took his talents to South Beach to form an NBA super team with Bosh and Wade, Miami has been planning a championship parade.
A regular season record of 58-24 was the first step towards their objective but now the climb becomes steeper with four testing best-of-seven series needing to be navigated to the summit.
"Our objective is winning, you can see it by our actions and the Big Three's actions," Heat centre Jamaal Magloire told reporters.
"We're ready, we're looking forward to playing Philadelphia, we've played hard the whole season... we've given ourselves an opportunity to go all the way."
In Chicago, Kyle Korver scored 19 points and Derrick Rose had 15 as the Bulls grabbed their ninth straight win, beating the New Jersey Nets 97-92.
In Phoenix, Marcin Gortat had 21 points as Phoenix denied San Antonio a chance for home-court advantage throughout the playoffs with a 106-103 win.
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