With NBA down to final four, Heat ‘meaningless’ season-ending loss in Orlando could loom large

It has largely been described as the Miami Heat’s meaningless season finale, often along the lines of “The Miami Heat won six consecutive games to secure the No. 1 playoff seed in the Eastern Conference before losing their meaningless regular-season finale.”

It turns out, a month after the fact, the 125-111 April 10 loss to the Orlando Magic at the Amway Center wasn’t so meaningless, after all.

Instead, it potentially could stand between the Heat and homecourt advantage in the NBA Finals.

With the Heat holding out virtually their entire primary rotation that evening in Orlando, and with the Golden State Warriors later that night defeating the New Orleans Pelicans, the Heat and Warriors closed the regular season with identical 53-29 records.

Because Golden State swept the two-game season series, that would mean homecourt advantage for the Warriors in a potential NBA Finals against the Heat.

Even though the Heat entered the playoffs as a No. 1 seed.

And even though the Warriors entered as a No. 3.

For Heat coach Erik Spoelstra, there is no looking back on what might have been.

“At that point,” he told the Sun Sentinel ahead of Tuesday night’s start of the Eastern Conference finals, “we were just focused on keeping guys healthy.”

So no Jimmy Butler, Bam Adebayo, Kyle Lowry, Tyler Herro, P.J. Tucker, Max Strus or Dewayne Dedmon that night – essentially what had been the primary rotation at the time.

Instead, ample time for fill-in starters such as Haywood Highsmith, Mychael Mulder and Omer Yurtseven, and even minutes off the bench from Javonte Smart and Udonis Haslem.

Of course, at that moment, the league-best Phoenix Suns, the No. 1 seed in the West, appeared far more likely to emerge from that side of the bracket, or even the No. 2 Memphis Grizzlies.

But then the Grizzlies lost to the Warriors in the second round, with the Suns losing their Sunday Game 7 to the Dallas Mavericks in their Western Conference semifinal.

So, yes, if the Mavericks, who closed the regular season 52-30, beat the Warriors in the Western Conference finals and meet the Heat in the NBA Finals, it would be the Heat as the home team.

Otherwise, if the Heat find their way through the Eastern Conference finals, it will have proven to have been a not-so-meaningless April night in Orlando, after all.

Spoelstra said he and his staff acknowledged as much in the moment, even as Butler remained behind in Miami, even as Highsmith launched 17 shots and Javonte Smart 14 on a night where the Heat focus was more on Victor Oladipo’s 40-point outing than a result that merely lifted the Magic to 22-60..

“We were aware of all the scenarios,” Spoelstra said.

So were the Warriors.

So on that same night, as almost all of the Heat’s familiar faces sat, the Warriors, still playing for playoff seeding in the Western Conference, started regulars such as Klay Thompson, Draymond Green and Jordan Poole in their victory over the Pelicans, with Thompson going for 41 points in 31 minutes that night.

Of the Heat’s five previous trips to the NBA Finals, they won as the lower seed against the Mavericks in 2006, lost as the lower seed against the Mavericks in 2011, won as the lower seed against the Oklahoma City Thunder in 2012, won as the higher seed against the San Antonio Spurs in 2013 and lost as the lower seed against the Spurs in 2014.

But, no matter that season-ending loss in Orlando, Spoelstra said. That was then. Now the focus is on these Eastern Conference finals with their Tuesday night start against the Boston Celtics at FTX Arena and the immediate challenge at hand.

So if it means taking flight earlier to San Francisco earlier than might have been deemed necessary, under the best-case-scenario of making the NBA Finals, it will be a diversion with a payoff.

“That would be a great problem to think about,” Spoelstra said, “if we were able to get past this series.”

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