Heat at Nets
The Miami Heat and the Brooklyn Nets are both expected to challenge for their respective divisions and the Eastern Conference crown this season, but both already fell to teams traditionally on the bottom. Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce and the Nets will look for their first win when they host the Heat on Friday. Garnett and Pierce had plenty of battles with the Heat when they were members of the Boston Celtics and already engaged in a little verbal sparing.
LeBron James expressed his dismay at Garnett and Pierce’s apparent hypocrisy for jumping to the Nets after criticizing Ray Allen for leaving the Celtics in favor of Miami the previous offseason. “Tell LeBron to worry about Miami,” Garnett said. “He has nothing to do with Celtic business.” James and Pierce engaged in some midseason intensity during a recent preseason game between the Heat and the Nets, and their battle will be closely monitored on Friday as the teams try to bounce back from losses to Philadelphia and Cleveland, respectively.
TV: 8 p.m. ET, ESPN, Sun Sports (Miami), YES (Brooklyn)
ABOUT THE HEAT (1-1): Miami made a statement on opening night with a complete dismantling of the Chicago Bulls but started poorly and later faded in the fourth quarter at Philadelphia on Wednesday as the team endured its first back-to-back set of the season. “You generally get what you deserve in this league and we earned that loss tonight,” Heat coach Eric Spoelstra said. The Heat sat guard Dwyane Wade against the 76ers and will monitor his health throughout the season. “It’s really part of a plan,” Spoelstra said. “It won’t be consistent necessarily all year that he won’t play back-to-backs.”
ABOUT THE NETS (0-1): Brooklyn is already capping minutes for point guard Deron Williams, who sat out the entire fourth quarter of the 98-94 loss to Cleveland after reaching his limit for the contest. Williams, who is expected to have that limit increased against the Heat, wants his team to change its mindset against the defending champs. “I don’t know if we felt like we were a better team than the Heat last year,” Williams said on ESPN. “And so I think in order for us to be able to beat them this year, we have to feel like we are a better team and we can beat them.”
BUZZER BEATERS
1. The Nets lost all three meetings last season by an average of 21 points and have dropped 13 straight to the Heat.
2. Brooklyn F Andrei Kirilenko (sore back) is expected to make his season debut Friday.
3. James is averaging 27.5 points, 7.2 rebounds and 7.6 assists in 33 career games against the Brooklyn/New Jersey franchise.