Heat hope to take show on the road when they battle Pistons

The Miami Heat’s offense has been firing at peak efficiency at home lately. They’ll try to stay red-hot when they visit the Detroit Pistons on Monday night.Miami carries a four-game winning streak into the contest with all of those victories recorded during a homestand. Miami has averaged 122.8 points during that stretch.Yet center Bam Adebayo has a different take on the streak.”I just feel like we’re making the right plays and we’re playing together,” he said. “Obviously, we’re doing it on the defensive end. Really getting stops, and really emphasizing and making that a priority.”After some early-season tinkering, coach Erik Spoelstra has settled on a starting lineup of Tyler Herro, Duncan Robinson, Jimmy Butler, Haywood Highsmith and Adebayo, and it’s working. Miami is 8-2 in games that unit has started.The Heat’s last trip to Detroit on Nov. 12 didn’t go well, particularly for Spoelstra. The game went to overtime and Spoelstra called a timeout he didn’t have with the score tied. That resulted in a technical foul and Malik Beasley’s free throw with 1.1 seconds left gave Detroit the lead in its 123-121 victory.Detroit had seven players in double figures that night, led by Beasley and Cade Cunningham with 21 points apiece.”As a coach, you always kind of think back,” Spoelstra said. “That could have been a win. But for players and coaching staff, alike, you just have opportunities to grow and get better constantly in this profession and that was an opportunity for me to check that box.”All the reminders, protocols, you can’t do those kind of scenarios enough, whether they’re in watching film, walking through stuff with the team, going through my own personal checklist,” Spoelstra added. “And this is a game of human error, at times. Hopefully, I’ve become better for that.”

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