Warriors at Heat
The Miami Heat intend to get the most out of Dwyane Wade in his final season but aren't looking like a team that will end that campaign in the playoffs with losses in three straight games. Things don't get any easier on Wednesday, when the defending champion Golden State Warriors come to Miami.
The Heat sit 1 1/2 games behind the eighth-place Charlotte Hornets in the Eastern Conference and dropped nine of 11 after allowing the Phoenix Suns to snap their franchise-record 17-game slide on Monday. "I know I sound like I've been saying this for a while, but there is a lot of good things going on with this basketball team," Miami coach Erik Spoelstra told reporters. "We just have to keep on forging, persevere, and not take any steps back from these unfortunate results because eventually you get your breakthrough. I know there's not a tremendous amount of time in the season, but there are some good things." The Warriors haven't looked their best since coming out of the All-Star break but managed to win the opener of the four-game road trip 121-110 at Charlotte on Monday behind a strong performance from center DeMarcus Cousins. "This is the happiest he has looked," Golden State coach Steve Kerr told reporters of Cousins. "He looked the most comfortable tonight. He made a couple of moves around the hoop where he showed great agility, but I think this is the best he's looked."
TV: 7:30 p.m. ET, NBCS Bay Area (Golden State), FS Sun (Miami)
ABOUT THE WARRIORS (43-17): Cousins logged a season-high 31 minutes against the Hornets and finished with 24 points on 9-of-15 shooting, 11 rebounds and three blocked shots in the win. The fiery former All-Star was also involved in a bizarre sequence in which he was hit with a technical foul (since rescinded) for tossing a shoe off the court. "He's got to be a little bit more delicate throwing it to the sideline -- like horseshoes," star guard Stephen Curry joked to reporters of the incident. "Just got to touch the line and sit down, not throw it in the stands. He's too strong, that's all. Too strong."
ABOUT THE HEAT (26-33): Miami will host the Warriors and then the surging Houston Rockets on Thursday in a brutal back-to-back and insists that it is not losing confidence, though it could use more effort on the defensive end. "We got to find a win and it has to be on the defensive end, instead of putting so much pressure on the offensive end," Wade told reporters. "That's where we've lost a lot of games this year, where normally that's where we win games. Just getting that stop, getting that rebound that we haven't been able to get." The Heat allowed the Western Conference-worst Suns shoot 50.6 percent from the floor on Monday.
BUZZER BEATERS
1. Heat PG Goran Dragic totaled 14 points on 7-of-18 shooting in his first two games after returning from knee surgery.
2. Warriors PF Jordan Bell (illness) sat out Monday and is day-to-day.
3. Golden State edged Miami 120-118 at home on Feb. 10 behind 39 points from Durant.