The Miami Heat continue their road trip on Sunday night against the 4-2 Los Angeles Lakers, after dropping to 3-2 themselves following a loss to the San Antonio Spurs on Thursday night.
This is the frontend of a LA back to back, as they face off against the Clippers just 24 hours later.
Norman Powell’s status remains in the air, as he is questionable to suit up tonight.
But let’s take a look at three primary keys for this match-up:
1. The Heat and Lakers differ in two main offensive areas…
As you should already know, the Miami Heat are leaning into two things this season: playing faster into transition, and drive and kick threes in the half-court. While the Heat rank at the top of the league in transition frequency, the Lakers rank 27th. Especially with Luka Doncic back in the fold, they’re a team that is going to try and slow it down into half-court basketball, manipulating switches and working a ton of pick and rolls. The other main difference between these two teams is the three point focus. The Lakers rank dead last in the NBA in three point attempts per game to start the year, which is pretty much the opposite of the Heat’s outlook. It’s a team that does a lot of their damage at the free throw line, so being disciplined guarding Doncic and Austin Reaves will be crucial to playing this game on their turf.
2. Looking for the go-to scoring punch: with and without Norman Powell.
As we await the official word on Norman Powell tonight, it’s important to keep track of the stylistic differences if he plays or doesn’t play. For starters, as his former team awaits the Heat on the second night of this back to back, it almost seems like that’ll be the focused return. In the two games the Heat played the Lakers last season, the offense all landed on their primary scorer and All-Star, Tyler Herro, who scored 34 and 31 points in their match-ups. If Powell can go, he can step into that sharpshooting role of leading the way for the Heat. But if he can’t, it really just has to be an “everybody can eat” mindset as it’s been each of the first five games. Filling the shoes of a Herro or Powell can’t be as simple as Bam Adebayo and Andrew Wiggins stepping up like they did against the Spurs. That’s not enough. The young guys and role players need to bring their offensive punch under the bright lights in L.A.
3. A potential get back on track game for Jaime Jaquez Jr.
The former UCLA Bruin, Jaime Jaquez Jr, always seems to enjoy heading back to the west coast to hoop. He showcased big games in his rookie year against the Lakers and Clippers, since it always seems to give a boost to guys when family and friends are in attendance. Aside from that, Jaquez is coming off a down game for his standards to start the season, which was sort of expected with that specific Spurs match-up. His mindset is to get everything going downhill and dominating around the basket, which is tough to do with 7’4 Victor Wembanyama making his presence felt in the paint. But now he finds himself in yet another positive match-up off the bench, with plenty of guys to attack with his back to the basket or isolating in the middle of the floor. Especially if this team is without Norman Powell, they’re going to need a scoring Jaquez in L.A. tonight.
