The Miami Heat found themselves 16 behind the Denver Nuggets, but continued to fight and cut the lead to two in the final seconds of this NBA Finals rematch.
Unfortunately, even after an ankle injury sidelined Jamal Murray for the second half, too many mistakes on both ends led the Nuggets to hold off the Heat, resulting in a 103-97 loss Thursday night in Denver .
Coming out of the five-man halftime break, the Heat immediately moved closer to tying the game as their first offensive possession resulted in a 3-pointer from Jimmy Butler. But the Nuggets responded with seven straight points, five coming from Michael Porter Jr. who terrorized Miami and finished with 30 points.
After falling down by nine, the Heat fought back and found themselves down only two after Terry Rozier took Porter’s pocket and hit his only 3 for the game in the corner.
I didn’t even see him there ???? pic.twitter.com/3O15uveAmk
– Miami HEAT (@MiamiHEAT) March 1, 2024
Shortly after, the Heat found themselves down four points, and Duncan Robinson had a left corner 3 in the same spot where Rozier hit his but missed, resulting in Aaron Gordon being fouled by Butler then that he was heading towards the basket. His free throws cut the lead to six. Porter then caught fire again and scored seven straight points for the Nuggets and, after a Christian Braun layup, Miami lost 78-65 in the blink of an eye.
The deficit widened in the fourth quarter after a corner 3 by Justin Holiday pushed Denver’s lead to 16, but Miami made one last push with 2:53 remaining. After a Kentavious Caldwell-Pope triple seemed to seal the deal for the Nuggets who led 97-87, Bam Adebayo and Terry Rozier combined to score the next eight points for the Heat, with a tough mid-range shooting combination. -distance and playing only one. another with one of Adebayo’s baskets coming off a pass from Rozier after a hard screen from Adebayo.
After Adebayo’s floater made it 99-95, the Nuggets’ next possession resulted in an offensive foul as Nikola Jokic was called for an illegal screen. Miami got the ball back with 39.2 on the clock, but the ensuing possession wasn’t pretty and resulted in a Rozier airball from behind the arc.
Rozier began to get into rhythm, but found much of his success in the midrange and around the basket, shooting 5 of 7 from 2 but just 1 of 8 from 3. He took four of those shots from center -city. A Butler layup then brought the Heat within two, but two Jokic free throws made it a two-possession game with 6.1 seconds left and sealed the game.
In this Finals rematch, the Heat’s defense kept them in the game and did a solid job on Jokic, holding him to 18 points on 15 shot attempts. But when it was time to play to tie the game or go on a run that could have turned the momentum around, the Heat couldn’t get over that hump.
