NBA – Miami Heat defeat the Atlanta Hawks for 2nd seed in the East

The Miami Heat took advantage of the motivational boost that came from defeating the Boston Celtics on Sunday, and brought out their A-game to survive a come-from-behind rally via the Hawks bench, that almost cost them the game and the No.2 seed. Head coach Erick Spoelstra took a very different approach to this game.

While, as we covered on the previous entry, the Boston Celtics decided to rest all of its key players, giving up the No.2 seed to the Heat, in Miami, Spoelstra started and played to the end all of his stars. He was certainly looking for a way to secure the No. 2 seed behind the Chicago Bulls in the east.

It might be a little too early to make any predictions, on which coach took the better approach. Spolestra wanted to secure the seed and he has the advantage of counting on a team filled with young players. Doc Rivers, on the other hand, has to consider that most of his players are in the tail end of their careers. So yes, Spolestra avoided a match against the New York Knicks in the Playoffs, but those extra, somewhat unnecessary minutes played by LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Dwayne Wade could affect them down the stretch.

LeBron James scored 34 points, 10 rebounds and 7 assists while guiding the Heat to a 98-90 win over the Atlanta Hawks. Extra kudos must go to the Hawks who nearly rallied from a 20-point deficit while playing the fourth quarter with little-used bench players against three of the NBA’s best. And that should worry the Miami Heat just a bit. Yes, they were quite terrific against the Boston Celtics, but once we begin the playoffs, anything can, and usually does, happen.

Josh Smith scored 17 points, 6 rebounds and 3 assists to lead the Hawks. With this defeat Atlanta has now lost a season-high five straight games, which is certainly not the way any team would like to close the season. Truth is, their first round playoff matchup with the Orlando Magic is not going to be easy, and the precedent they built last season doesn’t help their case either. The Magic wiped out the Hawks in four straight games a year ago in the Playoffs firs round.

It wasn’t an easy game for the Heat. Yes, they won, but like we mentioned before, the Hawks were heavily taking their chances while giving so many minutes to bench players. The Miami Heat appeared to had cracked the game by the time there where only 6 1/2 minutes left of the second quarter, hitting 11 of its last 14 shots.

Dwayne Wade handled most of the scoring load with 13 points — including 9 in a row — during a closing 25-15 run that turned a tight game into a 62-46 lead for the Heat by the halftime break. James and Bosh did the rest, combining for Miami’s other points during the spurt.

It is still uncertain what sort of performance the Heat are going to put together this postseason. Yes, they have clinched the no.2 seed in the Eastern Conference but we are talking about a team that underwent a mayor overhaul last summer, and that were struggling at 9-8 late in November. Yes, Miami got better, a lot better. But just over a month ago, they lost five in a row. Now Miami is heading to the playoffs with 14 wins in their last 17 games. That should make things interesting.