The Heat Made Shots When It Counted
Miami clinched the Southwest Division after tonight's game
Suns-96
Heat-105
Suns Boxscore |
Heat Boxscore
Marion didn't have enough highlight dunks in order for the Suns to get the victory
MIAMI, March 25 (Ticker) -- Wade had 20 points 2-2 from three point range. The Heat clinched the Southeast Division title and moved to the number two spot in the Eastern Conference with the win against Phoenix. Wade had his usual array of spectacular aerials around the basket -- but how he capped the fourth quarter was the big highlight. He stoled the ball from Steve Nash, spinned past Walter McCarty at midcourt and put down a highlight reel dunk that put the Miami crowd on their feet. "It felt real good when the crowd got behind me," Wade said.
"It's always good to win something," said Wade, who also grabbed 5 rebounds in the game. "Last year, we felt like we didn't win anything. To win a division title with a lot of games left, it's a great feeling." Shaquille O'Neal had 12 of his 15 points in the 2nd half and Damon Jones added 17 points and a season-high 15 assists for Miami (46-24), which won its 19th game out of 21 games and claimed its first division title since the 1999-00 season. Amare Stoudemire led Phoenix (51-17) with 26 points, Shawn Marion added 21 and Steve Nash had 22 points and 13 assists. “We didn't get enough stops," Phoenix coach Mike D'Antoni said. "I thought we scored enough probably to be in the game but we didn't stop them. They hit shots and Wade went off.
There was no celebration for the Heat afterward; Eddie Jones didn't even know the game sealed the division. Clearly, Miami has its sights on bigger goals. "None of those titles mean anything to me unless it's the big one. ... I want to end the date correctly. I want to end the date with a smash," O'Neal said. Miami led by as many as 14 in the final quarter, before Marion scored 8 points in a 15-2 Phoenix run that drew the Suns to 96-90 with 2:52 left. But O'Neal slammed home a miss by Wade with 2:25 left, and the Heat hung the battle of two of the best teams in the league. "You'd be lying if you said it was just one of 82 games," Richardson said. "Everyone knows there's pride on the line. We want to show that we can play with them, especially late in the season like this."
"I thought we started the game in the first quarter and probably played the best quarter of defense we played all year," said Heat coach Stan Van Gundy, whose team led 26-23 after one period. "And we made that lead stand up with our offense the rest of the way." could come out of the East, so if we make it to the Finals we could be playing them."
GAME NOTES
Damon Jones was two assists shy of a career-high in assists with 15 . With the Nasdaq-100 Open going on in nearby Key Biscayne, plenty of tennis greats -- including Andre Agassi, Steffi Graf, Boris Becker and Maria Sharapova -- were in the crowd, as were football stars Willis McGahee and Warren Sapp, plus hip-hop mogul Sean "P. Diddy" Combs.
Game Photos
Shaq trying to take advantage of the smaller Stoudemire
Steve Nash going up with the one-hand runner in the paint
Marion scored 21 points in tonight's game
Dwyane Wade led the Heat with 20 points
Stoudemire throwing down the one-hand jam
thanks for pointing that out too...yea its going to be tough because they have 3 shooters with the two jones so it should be an interesting matchup.
....... Hell who Am I fooling 
well i dont kno what to say either 
