1. Close your eyes and picture this.
On one side, you have a veteran, experienced team coming off their second consecutive deep postseason run in their home opener. On the other, a young, hungry and talented group with minimal continuity getting their first minutes together this season. Think for a few seconds what that matchup would look like.
You just watched HEAT vs. Pistons. Well, most of it.
Detroit found themselves up 12-5 early, hitting threes using their size on both ends, but it was the attrition of youth and inexperience which plagued them for the rest of the half as the HEAT no-mistaked their way to a double-digit lead. Only Cade Cunningham (18 points on 11 shots in the first half) had the patience in the half-court to attack Miami’s floor-shrinking defense as Detroit ran up 14 turnovers to Miami’s four. The rest of the Pistons were full steam ahead, brute forcing their way through driving lanes closing in on the ball, and on the other end the gap in game reps was best shown by who jumped at one, Miami consistently the pump fakers, Detroit the pump fakees biting on at least six rather mundane mid-range fakes as the Bam Adebayo (12 points on six shots in the half) got to the line and rookie Jaime Jaquez Jr. – in the rotation tonight with Josh Richardson and Haywood Highsmith sidelined – got himself to the rim. Miami by 11 at the break despite average half-court efficiency, both teams making at least half their threes.
As they got out and got running in the second half, the Pistons momentarily threatened again, but the HEAT just kept running their stuff – and hitting their threes, albeit on low volume – to stay up by teens as Cunningham began to miss a few jumpers and Bam Adebayo did not. Still, Detroit hung around as they cut down their turnovers (none in the third), Miami leading 83-75 after three.
Miami’s bench took things from there, stretching the lead out to 19 just a couple of minutes in the fourth, and it looked like it would be a formality from there, but Cunningham flipped the youth vs. experience script and kept Detroit’s train on the rails as the lead shrunk to five following a 14-0 run. Fittingly, on the very next possession Jimmy Butler (19 points on 18 shots) got another player into the air with a fake and got himself to the line.
The first game of the season became a clutch game (editor’s note: we are so back) a one-point game with 1:44 to play after a Cunningham three. Adebayo (22 points on 13 shots) stopped Cunningham a couple of times to hold the lead, but Detroit still had a chance with 2.5 seconds left. A Cunningham miss as the clock expired, with plenty of nerves heard throughout the building as the shot went up. Detroit had the talent to take this one but Miami wins, 103-102, in exactly the way they know how.
2. Even though it’s the first game of the season and there’s a hunger for the fresh and the new, Miami looked almost exactly like you would expect them to look – a good thing if you’re thinking about postseason viability.
Kyle Lowry and Kevin Love joined Tyler Herro, Jimmy Butler and Adebayo in the starting group and despite a slow start the process was mostly a carryover from last season, with Adebayo getting post touches, Herro calling Adebayo up for pick-and-rolls and Butler picking his spots to get into the paint. The rest of the rotation filled out with Thomas Bryant as the backup center, Caleb Martin the first off the bench, Dru Smith handling some point guard duties, Duncan Robinson – playing just as well as he did in the postseason, hitting 3-of-5 from three and leveraging his gravity to get himself downhill when appropriate – and, in perhaps a minor surprise, Jaquez Jr. While Jaquez Jr. is a four-year college player, thus just a bit more experienced than your typical one-and-one draftee, it’s not small thing that he looked like he belonged as Erik Spoelstra directed mid-post touches his way – touches that either became up-and-go fakes, attacking smaller players like Joe Harris, or patient and on-target passes for Robinson. Perhaps most encouraging was one possession where Jaquez Jr. (six points on 3-of-3 shooting, two assists, two steals) tried a move on the bigger Isaiah Stewart, ran into a wall and instead of forcing it, immediately found his escape route and got off the ball. Self-awareness is sometimes just as valuable as a deep bag.
As most everything about Miami’s offense looked every bit the part we’ve become familiar with and accustomed to – especially since last season when Herro joined the starters and Adebayo found his balance on that end – it was the rookie working out of the post and even bringing the ball up the floor, with the trust of his coach, who is the pleasant surprise of the night.
3. While this is Cunningham’s third season, it’s just the third game against the HEAT for the former No. 1 pick after missing most of last season. As such, even while all the buzz will be about the HEAT after winning their season opener in professional fashion, it’s always notable when they run up against a young player who is less-than-phased against a defense that has thwarted and confused many a talent.
In a similar manner to the way Luka Doncic has given them problems, Cunningham was patient but not passive with the ball, not allowing himself to get baited into driving at help while taking the open space when Miami afforded it to him because of the threat of his passing. There wasn’t much going to the rim, but with Detroit often having multiple big men on the floor there wasn’t much available going towards the rim, either, as nobody would claim that the Pistons are perfectly set up around Cunningham as most young teams are not as they learn about their building blocks. It was Cunningham who settled his team in the second half and Cunningham who scored or assisted on nearly Detroit’s entire run that nearly stole the game.
There aren’t many young talents in the league that have looked like Cunningham (30 points on 26 shots, nine assists) did tonight against a Spoelstra defense, and those players tend to be the ones you meet in the playoffs somewhere down the road.