L.A. Lakers blow out underdog Miami Heat in Game 1 of NBA Finals as injuries pile up
The Miami Heat’s first NBA Finals game started about as well as the Heat could have hoped for and then quickly descended into disaster.
An early 13-point lead disintegrated by the end of the first quarter and the Los Angeles Lakers flipped their early deficit into a 17-point lead by halftime.
In Game 1 of the 2020 NBA Finals, Miami looked every bit like the massive underdog and the Lakers blew out the Heat, 116-98, to take a 1-0 series lead in Lake Buena Vista.
LeBron James, playing in the Finals for the fifth time since he left Miami in 2014, scored 25 points, grabbed 13 rebounds and dished out nine assists, and Anthony Davis, playing in his first ever Finals game, led Los Angeles with 34 points. All-Star wing Jimmy Butler led the Heat with 23 points and Miami only had two players score more than 14 points.
It was ugly by halftime and it got worse almost immediately in the third quarter. Guard Goran Dragic, the Heat’s leading scorer throughout the Eastern Conference playoffs, did not play in the second half because of a left foot injury. All-Star post player Bam Adebayo went down with an apparent left shoulder injury in the third quarter and did not return.
The Heat were the ultimate feel-good story of the first three rounds of the 2020 NBA playoffs, the lowest-seeded team to make it to the Finals since 1999, doing so without a single player selected in the top eight of an NBA draft.
Miami leaned on undrafted players like Duncan Robinson and rookies like Tyler Herro to upset the Indiana Pacers, Milwaukee Bucks and Boston Celtics while losing just three total games. Even the Heat’s only two All-Stars — Butler and Adebayo — were drafted outside the top 10.
Led by those two forwards, Miami still charged out to a 23-10 lead against James, Davis and the Lakers, playing nearly flawless basketball for the first six and a half minutes. Adebayo scored six early points against Davis. Butler scored nine and handed out two assists, taking his increasingly typical aggressive-early approach.
Forward Jae Crowder, who shot 4 of 28 from three-point range in the final four games of the NBA Conference Finals against the Boston Celtics, hit two three-pointers, his second forcing Lakers coach Frank Vogel to take a timeout with 5:36 left in the first quarter and a blowout brewing at Walt Disney World’s ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex.
Instead, it became a rout for Los Angeles.
Lakers point guard Rajon Rondo hit a jumper and wing Andre Iguodala answered with a dunk, and then Los Angeles’ first big run began. Lakers combo guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope drilled back-to-back threes and Los Angeles ripped off a 19-3 run to end the first quarter and put the Lakers ahead 31-28.
In the second quarter, Los Angeles’ lead ballooned.
Herro briefly caught fire, hitting back-to-back threes to put the Heat back ahead 43-31 and prompting another Lakers timeout with 7:30 left in the first half, and, again, Los Angeles responded. The Lakers scored 13 straight points and pushed the lead back to 65-48 at halftime.
Miami won all season by beating teams at the three-point line, at the free-throw line and off the bench. At halftime, Los Angeles was winning in all of those categories with a 33-21 edge from the beyond the arc, a 10-3 edge at the line and a 20-10 edge in bench points.
The Lakers outscored the Heat, 62-39, across the second and third quarter, and led by as much as 32 in the second half. For the first time this postseason, Miami will have to come from behind to win a series after its worst loss of the playoffs.
