| Barkley, Blind Squirrels, The Hulk And Superman Authored by Mike Leffman - April 27, 2005 - 5:46 pm
“The Hulk carried Superman today,” said Shaquille O’Neal, after Miami’s game two 104-87 win over the New Jersey Nets.
He was referring to Alonzo Mourning’s 21-point, nine-rebound performance in just 16 minutes of action. While it is unknown if it had any actual affect, Charles Barkley did remark on TNT a few weeks ago that Mourning will have to step-up his game if the Heat want to go deep into the playoffs.
Barkley can be right on occasions – especially since he talks so much – but it harps back on that old proverb “...a blind squirrel finds a nut eventually.”
Not that Mourning is concerned with the words of Barkley or blind squirrels. One thing he should be concerned with is his aggression. Six fouls in 16 minutes. Yes, the referees were calling the game tight – seemingly more so against Mourning – but you can’t blame him for wanting to come out and make a statement against his old team that he felt wasn’t championship material. (He’s right. They’re not.) Heat Coach Stan Van Bundy even credited Mourning with almost single-handedly helping the Heat win game two.
Obviously there is no reason to get terribly excited since home-court advantage is huge in the NBA playoffs and all three home teams (Detroit, Seattle, Miami) won by huge margins Tuesday night. Those same three teams didn’t have much trouble either in game one on their home courts.
Things will be different as the Heat arrive in New Jersey for Thursday’s matchup where the Nets have won 10 of their last 13 playoff games. Then again, the Heat are 2-0 at New Jersey this year winning 100-77 and 106-90, respectively.
Game one differed vastly from game two since in the first Miami played a typical Miami game (i.e. the starting five were the game). Although Christian Laettner did a decent job off the bench hitting four of four shots in 13 minutes of playing time finishing with eight points. Too bad he was the leading scorer off the bench.
But Sunday’s game two showed that Keyon Dooling can also be effective bench player when needed. He added 10 points in 17 minutes finishing second as leading bench scorer. Laettner also grabbed five rebounds in 13 minutes despite only getting two points.
So going into game three the only stat that matters if Miami wants to contend for the NBA Finals: (16) bench points in game one versus (39) bench points in game two. When your starting lineup averaged 82.3 points per game in the regular-season, it’s easy to see the difference those bench points make. It can be the difference between a blow-out and a tight OT game.
New Jersey will be tougher as the series goes on and Van Gundy seems intent on letting some starters pace themselves through this round, making the above stat critical for the next two games.
It should also be noted Miami had nine- and 12-point leads going into halftime of games’ one and two. That gave them enough confidence to let the bench get in some quality work.
Will Van Gundy stick to his starting five and burn them out or can Mourning, Dooling and Laettner continue to pick up the slack? |
