{"id":303226,"date":"2023-06-02T06:30:44","date_gmt":"2023-06-02T06:30:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=303226"},"modified":"2023-06-02T08:59:19","modified_gmt":"2023-06-02T08:59:19","slug":"weird-history-made-in-nba-finals-opener","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=303226","title":{"rendered":"'Weird' history made in NBA Finals opener"},"content":{"rendered":"

Miami<\/a> could blame it on fatigue, or that much-talked-about Mile High elevation.<\/p>\n

Or maybe this was just one of those nights.<\/p>\n

Whatever the reason, the Heat had plenty of open looks in game one of the NBA<\/a> Finals on Friday (AEST) but couldn't knock them down during a 104-93 loss to the Denver Nuggets.<\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Player charged for act that put Blues star in hospital<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Ricciardo's $414k act after ugly McLaren split<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> The<\/strong><\/a> Blues suggestion Gus can't cop<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

\"Jimmy<\/p>\n

"When you look at it during the game, they all look like the right shots and I'm not saying that we can't as a team make those, but we've got to get more layups," said Jimmy Butler, who had 13 points.<\/p>\n

"That's it as a whole. We've got to attack the rim a lot more, myself included."<\/p>\n

The stat lines were hard to fathom: Max Strus, 0 for 10. Duncan Robinson, 1 of 6.<\/p>\n

\"Caleb<\/p>\n

Even Caleb Martin, who had a stellar showing in the Eastern Conference finals, wasn't immune. He finished 1 of 7.<\/p>\n

Coach Erik Spoelstra won't be saying much other than possibly this: Don't read too much into it. Just one night.<\/p>\n

"We also have ignitable guys. You see a couple go through and that also can become an avalanche," Spoelstra said.<\/p>\n

\"Coach<\/p>\n

"One way or the other, we have to find a way to get the job done."<\/p>\n

This was far from a shooting clinic for the Heat.<\/p>\n

They did make a flurry of shots in the fourth quarter to show what they can do and make the numbers a little prettier (40.6 per cent from the floor) than they might have been.<\/p>\n

Then again, the Nuggets felt they had a little something to do with Miami's wayward aim.<\/p>\n

"Our guys did a great job of defending without fouling," Nuggets coach Michael Malone said.<\/p>\n

Denver committed just eight fouls total, resulting in only one trip to the line by Haywood Highsmith, who made both.<\/p>\n

\"Christian<\/p>\n

It tied for the fewest free throws made in a playoff game, broke the record for fewest attempts from the line in a playoff game and set an NBA Finals records for fewest free throws made and attempted.<\/p>\n

"I didn't even realise it was two free throws only, and it was only my two free throws," Highsmith said.<\/p>\n

"So that was pretty interesting. I think we were aggressive, but we did shoot a lot of jump shots because we were open.<\/p>\n

"It's weird having two free throws. I've never seen that before."<\/p>\n

Added Bam Adebayo: "We made history."<\/p>\n

"I mean, when we got in the locker room and (saw) the stat sheet," Adebayo said, "I feel like we were all shocked that we only had two free throws."<\/p>\n

\"Bam<\/p>\n

In this make-or-miss league, quite a few of the Heat struggled to get into any sort of rhythm through three quarters.<\/p>\n

Sometimes, shots just don't fall.<\/p>\n

The Heat advanced to the Finals because of Boston's ineffectiveness from the outside in game seven, when the Celtics were 9 of 42.<\/p>\n

In Denver, the Heat got a small taste of what it felt like.<\/p>\n

"I just feel like we took a lot of jump shots, and we missed a lot of them," Adebayo said.<\/p>\n

"We're going to watch film and get back to the drawing board."<\/p>\n

For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/strong><\/em> clicking here<\/strong><\/em><\/a>!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Miami could blame it on fatigue, or that much-talked-about Mile High elevation. Or maybe this was just one of those nights. Whatever the reason, the […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":303228,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303226"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=303226"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303226\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":303234,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303226\/revisions\/303234"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/303228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=303226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=303226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=303226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}