Terry Rozier delivers in clutch to lift Heat to road win over Cavs. Takeaways and details

Five takeaways from the Miami Heat’s 107-104 win over the Cleveland Cavaliers (43-26) on Wednesday night at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse to close its four-game trip at 3-1. The Heat (38-31) now returns to Miami to begin a four-game homestand on Friday against the New Orleans Pelicans:

Both teams were very short-handed. But the Heat had Jimmy Butler and Terry Rozier, and that proved to be enough.

The Heat played without Bam Adebayo (lower back contusion), Tyler Herro (right foot medial tendinitis), Kevin Love (right heel bruise), Josh Richardson (season-ending right shoulder surgery) and Duncan Robinson (back discomfort).

The Cavaliers were missing Ty Jerome (right ankle surgery), Donovan Mitchell (nasal fracture), Evan Mobley (left ankle sprain), Max Strus (right knee strain) and Dean Wade (right knee sprain).

But the Heat’s duo of Butler and Rozier combined for 54 points on 35 field-goal attempts, lifting the injury-depleted Heat to the win.

Butler finished with 30 points on 11-of-19 shooting from the field, 2-of-4 shooting on threes and 6-of-7 shooting from the foul line, four rebounds, five assists and four steals in 37 minutes after missing the previous two games with a right foot contusion.

Rozier closed with 24 points on 8-of-16 shooting from the field and 5-of-6 shooting on threes, three rebounds and two assists in 33 minutes.

More importantly, Butler and Rozier combined to score 17 of the team’s 24 points in the fourth quarter to help the Heat pull off a late-game comeback and hold on for the win.

After the Cavaliers pulled ahead by four points with 1:34 left in the fourth quarter, the Heat closed the contest on a game-winning 11-4 run led by Rozier.

Butler and Rozier combined to score each of the Heat’s 11 points during this game-deciding stretch, but Rozier scored nine of them.

Rozier delivered clutch moment after clutch moment in front of a large group of family and friends in his hometown of Cleveland.

“Terry put on a show, man,” Butler said. “When half the arena is there to see you, you got to come out and do your thing.”

With the Heat trailing by four, Rozier began the run by hitting a step-back three from the left wing while being fouled by Cavaliers forward Isaac Okoro. Rozier made the free throw to complete the four-point play and tie the game at 100 with 1:24 remaining.

“I was just trying to shake Okoro off, trying to give him a step-back or something like that because he does a great job of guarding,” Rozier said. “Then he fouled me, so that was even better.”

The Heat then forced the Cavaliers into a shot-clock violation.

On the next possession, Butler made a contested fadeaway baseline jumper to give the Heat a two-point lead with 39.2 seconds left.

But the Cavaliers came back to tie the game at 102 on a dunk from Jarrett Allen with 31.9 seconds to play.

That’s when Rozier made the game-winner, sinking another step-back three over Okoro — this one from the right wing — to put the Heat ahead by three points with 14.5 seconds left.

The Cavaliers then went for the two instead of the game-tying three, cutting the deficit to one with 3.7 seconds left.

Cleveland was forced to foul to keep the game going and Rozier made both free throws to push the Heat’s lead back up to three with 2.8 seconds remaining.

The Cavaliers had one final opportunity to tie the game, but could not advance the ball because they were left with no timeouts. So Cavaliers guard Darius Garland was forced into a 34-foot heave that would have tied the game, but it bounced off the front of the rim as the final buzzer sounded.

The Heat lost the fourth quarter 29-24, but still won because it entered the period with an eight-point lead prior to the dramatic finish.

“This is why we wanted him here, he’s a great clutch performer and he’s been that way his entire career,” Spoelstra said of Rozier. “And we needed another guy that could make plays and create something out of nothing. That’s what he basically did those last two possessions.”

Amid the Heat’s ongoing injury issues, the Heat used another different starting lineup.

After setting a new franchise record with its 32nd different starting lineup of the season in Sunday’s win over the Detroit Pistons earlier this trip, the Heat used its 33rd different starting group of the season on Wednesday.

The Heat started a lineup of Rozier, Patty Mills, Butler, Nikola Jovic and Thomas Bryant against the Cavaliers. Wednesday’s start was the first time this group has played together this season, which isn’t that surprising considering Mills signed with the Heat on March 6 after being waived by the Atlanta Hawks in late February.

But this unit still was a positive, outscoring the Cavaliers by seven points in 12 minutes together on Wednesday.

Mills started in the role of floor spacer in place of Robinson, who started in 12 straight games before missing Wednesday’s contest with back discomfort. It marked Mills’ first start of the season and just his third start in the last two seasons.

Mills finished the win with 10 points on 3-of-11 shooting from the field and 1-of-8 shooting on threes, four assists and two steals in 25 minutes.

“Patty is such a savvy veteran winning player that if you don’t look past whatever the shooting numbers may be, you don’t see all the nuances of how he helps,” Spoelstra said. “He’s been a plus in basically every game that he’s played in and he definitely impacts our offense with his spacing and his movement.”

Bryant started at center in place of Adebayo, who has started in each of his 58 appearances this season. It marked Bryant’s fourth start of the season.

Bryant closed the win with six points, 10 rebounds and one block in 15 minutes.

“Thomas just continues to get more comfortable and more acclimated to what we do,” Spoelstra said.

The Heat’s injuries also led to an opportunity for center Orlando Robinson to play extended minutes just one night after playing in the G League.

On Tuesday in the G League, Robinson recorded 25 points and 12 rebounds to help lead the Sioux Falls Skyforce to a win in Mississippi.

On Wednesday in the NBA, Robinson finished with eight points, two rebounds and two assists in 13 minutes off the bench.

With Adebayo and Love out, the Heat went with a center rotation of Bryant and Orlando Robinson.

It marked the most minutes Robinson has played since the Heat’s March 2 home win over the Utah Jazz.

The Heat used Robinson, Jaime Jaquez Jr., Caleb Martin, Delon Wright and Haywood Highsmith off its bench to complete its 10-man rotation on Wednesday.

“As great as Terry was down the stretch, everybody on our roster put their fingerprints on this game,” Spoelstra said. “We would not have gotten this win in a tough building where they play extremely well at home unless we didn’t have a lot of guys step up.

“Caleb, his defensive work, Jaime was very good, and Delon and H in their short minutes were really impactful defensively.”

With some of the Heat’s top three-point shooters out, others on the roster had to turn up their three-point volume.

With Herro, Love and Robinson unavailable, the Heat was without arguably its top three three-point shooters. This trio has also combined to average 19.7 three-point attempts per game this season.

But even with that large chunk of three-point shooting missing, the Heat still got up 36 three-point attempts against the Cavaliers. Miami closed 13 of 36 (36.1 percent) from three-point range.

How?

Jovic put up a career-high 10 three-point attempts, finishing 4 of 10 from deep. He finished with 14 points and six rebounds after missing the previous two games with a strained right hamstring.

“Niko was terrific,” Spoelstra said. “He really worked the last few days to be available and produced, gave us spacing, gave us playmaking, knocked down threes, gave us some intangible plays and our bench was very good all the way down. “

Mills tied a season-high with eight three-point attempts.

Rozier added six three-point attempts, and Butler and Martin each put up for threes.

With the Heat now returning to Miami after this four-game trip, there aren’t many road games left on its schedule.

The Heat has 13 games left on it schedule — nine at home and four on the road.

The Heat opens this 13-game stretch with a four-game homestand that begins Friday against the New Orleans Pelicans.

The only road games left on the Heat’s schedule: March 31 against the Washington Wizards, April 5 against the Houston Rockets, April 7 against the Indiana Pacers and April 9 against the Atlanta Hawks.

This is an advantage the Heat has over the two primary teams its competing with for the sixth spot to avoid the NBA’s play-in tournament.

After Wednesday, the Indiana Pacers have seven road games left and the Philadelphia 76ers have eight road games left on their schedules.

But in order to make the most of this advantage, the Heat has to win most of its home games down the stretch. Miami actually has a higher winning percentage on the road (21-16) than it does at home (17-15) this season.

After Wednesday’s games, the Heat moved up in the Eastern Conference standings from eighth to seventh place. The Heat stands one-half game behind the sixth-place Pacers and is ahead of the 76ers — despite having the same record — by virtue of the head-to-head tiebreaker.

News note: Adebayo said the decision was made to miss Wednesday’s game in Cleveland with a lower back contusion after a conversation with Spoelstra.

“We got guys back, so he told me it was time to take one,” Adebayo said, referring to the returns of Butler and Jovic.

Adebayo called the absence “more maintenance than anything.”