Heat at Lakers on Monday Night: Doncic Is Coming Off 45, and Miami's Answer Starts With Antetokounmpo
The Heat's five-game West Coast trip opens Monday night at Crypto.com Arena (10 p.m. ET) against a 5-2 Lakers team on the second night of a back-to-back — and against Luka Doncic, the league's leading scorer, who hung 45 on Toronto on Sunday night.
The Miami Heat's road trip starts with the hardest assignment in basketball right now. Miami (2-4, two straight wins) visits the Los Angeles Lakers (5-2) on Monday night at Crypto.com Arena, tipoff 10 p.m. Eastern, in the teams' first meeting of the season — and the Lakers are playing the second night of a back-to-back after beating Toronto 131-125 on Sunday night behind Luka Doncic's 45 points, 15 rebounds, six assists and five steals.
Doncic is the problem Erik Spoelstra spent the weekend describing. The Lakers star is averaging 36.2 points, 7.6 assists and 6.8 rebounds as the league's leading scorer, and Spoelstra told reporters at practice that Doncic creates a pick-and-roll coverage all to himself, one that has to be unique because there is nothing he has not seen. Bam Adebayo's version was shorter: make him take difficult shots. Miami's new wrinkle is size — Giannis Antetokounmpo, averaging 28.2 points, 12.3 rebounds and 5.5 assists, is the defender Los Angeles did not have to solve in this matchup last season, with Adebayo (27 points against Indiana on Friday) free to work inside.
The rest of the edges are Miami's to use. The Heat have scored 274 points in two games — 129 against Atlanta and 145 against Indiana, on 58 percent shooting Friday, with Antetokounmpo's 31-point triple-double, Adebayo's 27 and Klay Thompson's 25 with seven threes — while the Lakers, for all their efficiency, are averaging nearly 18 turnovers a night. The Lakers have ruled out Ziaire Williams and Adou Thiero again; Miami lists Tim Hardaway Jr. as questionable for personal reasons. A rested 2-4 team against a 5-2 team that played last night: Monday is where the trip's tone gets set.
