NBA: The Heat Season: Who needs a superstar?

The Miami Heat (22-17) are playing in the Eastern Conference for the home advantage in the playoffs despite their great injury pitch. Especially in tight games they can hardly be calculated – because Head Coach Erik Spoelstra has created “Stars auf Abruf” from role-players.

Dion Waiters. Justise Winslow. Okaro White. A.J. Hammons. Rodney McGruder.

This is the Miami Heat’s list of casualties – just the current one, mind you. If you add players like Hassan Whiteside, Goran Dragic or James Johnson, who have all missed a bunch of games, you would have almost the entire core of the squad.

In short: Hardly any other team in the league has to cope with more defaults in the current season. Nevertheless, the Heat are still in fourth place in the East and play for the home advantage in the playoffs. Of course, there were and still are performance fluctuations on South Beach in the current season. There were unnecessary bankruptcies against the Nets and Hawks, but victories in Boston or at the Timberwolves.

However, with five wins in a row, the trend is clearly pointing upwards. Head coach Erik Spoelstra has managed to establish a culture of “next man up”, which is almost on track. This has resulted in several winners, all of whom ensure that Heat in Clutch moments belong to the Association’s elite.

Josh Richardson has been directly involved in two recent successes. In his OT win over the Knicks, he scored two important free throws in overtime, a few days later against Jazz, dropping the winning layup five seconds to the end and strongly defending Donovan Mitchell’s subsequent game winner attempt.

As one of Spoelstras’ favourite players, the 24-year-old has developed into an indispensable starter, and in the current season he has been on the scene in all 40 games from the very beginning. He plays and defends many positions – for the All-Star Voting he is even listed as a Forward with his 1.98 meters “I didn’t know that at all. That’s what I saw on Instagram. But it’s already cool,”he said.

Whoever thinks Richardson and the All-Star Game are two worlds apart forever, has made the calculation without coach Spoelstra:”People should finally start to acknowledge his great defense. He has the talent and mentality for the All-Defensive First Team. This combination, according to the coach’s argumentation, will one day automatically catapult Richardson into the all-star conversation if his development continues.

Due to the chronic ankle problems of volume scorer Dion Waiters, Wayne Ellington plays a bigger role than Richardson. The Shooting Guard is currently running hot from downtown: in the last ten games he has taken an average of 9.1 throws from outside, with a quota of 39.6 percent.

Against the Knicks, he set a new franchise record with 16 own attempts to triumph the Heat with 42 Triples, setting up a new best franchise brand. I think I’ll have to go up to Pat Riley and then we’ll discuss that the ball should go into the post office more often,”says Spoelstra, who still likes to go to the old school on South Beach.

Ellington, on the other hand, should not be limited to shooting. He works on the board and helps the Bigs in rebound duels, fights in defense, doesn’t mind playing Hustle-Play “I may be known as Shooter, but I’m a basketball player. It is part of Heat’s identity to play something dirty in case of doubt,”he says about himself.

Recently against the Raptors he proved that he can’t only throw: he personally decided the exciting contest by driving layup. He surprised everyone, even his coach:”That was probably the last thing anyone expected from him,”said Spoelstra.

Someone who has not yet benefited from the positive trend in Miami is Center Hassan Whiteside. Since recovering from his knee injury and returning to the Starting Five, he hangs up 11.5 points and 8.3 rebounds in 22.1 minutes. As the best earner and supposed star of the team, no one gets away with it. And last but not least, he had to watch again and again in the hot phase of the game, because Spoelstra bets on a small lineup.

James Johnson and Kelly Olynyk like to form the common frontcourt in this one. Why?”With Johnson and Olynyk on the field, we’re even more versatile than before. With them you have two bigs who can dribble the ball, throw it and go to the post office. This poses challenges for every opponent”, the coach explained his decision.

European champion Goran Dragic also likes the small version, which brings more space. The dragon likes that the zone is not so clogged up and he has more space to tighten and lock his drives.

Whiteside (still) understands his own dilemma:”We are fifth in the east[in the meantime even fourth, d. Red.]. It looks good. So we’re not doing so much wrong. The coach is trying to get variable lineups on the floor.”

Success proves the Spoelstra to be right, after all, his heat has become one of the best teams in the league when it comes to deciding on close matches.

By definition, a game is “clutch”if it is in the last five minutes and the difference in points between the two teams is no more than 5. If this is true, the Heat shows a balance of 17-7. This corresponds to a victory rate of 70.8 percent, which puts them in fourth place in the league, behind the title contenders Boston, Golden State and San Antonio. In absolute terms, only Celtics have achieved more “clutch”victories than Miami (20 vs. 17).

It’s unusual that a team without a classic star or closeer plays so well in crunchtime. But the loose hierarchy in the team – top scorer is Dragic with “only” 16.9 points, eight players on average score double-digit points – ensures that each player has the permission and the self-confidence to take on responsibility. A few examples: In the moments defined as clutch, Richardson hits 57 percent from the field and 58 percent from downtown. Waiters’ odds are beyond the 50 percent mark, Ellington also scores half of his throws.

This means that hardly any opponent can adapt to what the heat is up to in a potentially decisive play. While in the NBA it is mostly standard practice to isolate the stars at the end of the game and let them do it, Spoelstra considers variable placements especially after time-outs and relies on passing. This is proven by another statistical extract: 51.5 percent of the field goals in the clutch time are preceded by an Assist for the Heat. By way of comparison, for the Thunders, who also already have 22 Clutch games in their books (balance sheet: 10-12), the figure is 32.9 percent.

Spoelstra’s reputation for getting the most out of young players and making leaders out of them on call is more fruitful this season than ever before. Or to put it in James Johnson’s words,”You fell on your head if you think we don’t have a closer. The opposite is the case: we have lots of them!”