Erik Spoelstra admits that Chris Bosh’s injury against Indiana Pacers had Miami Heat worried – NBA News
When the Miami Heat lost Chris Bosh in game-1 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals against the Indiana Pacers, they insisted that Bosh’s absence wouldn’t hurt their campaign much, even after losing Game 2 and 3. That eventually
turned out to be the case as the Heat won the series in 6 games, but after his team qualified for the NBA Finals for a second year in a row, coach Erik Spoelstra has revealed that the injury to Bosh had shook them big time;
“Even though we didn’t admit it, we all had a big pit in our stomach when we saw him walking off the court in Game 1 of the Indiana series,” Spoelstra said. “We all shuddered at the thought (of him missing the rest of the playoffs).
We played tough, but we knew that for two years he had been our most important player, because he makes it all work.”
In Game 2 and 3 of the Eastern semifinals, Miami were exposed on the paint as it took some time for the likes Ronny Turiaf, Joel Anthony and Udonis Haslem to fill in the power forward’s shoes. The series was however saved by the
brilliance of the remaining two cogs of Miami’s big three - LeBron James and Dwyane Wade.
The duo carried Heat in the first two games of the Conference Finals as well, but the Boston Celtics effectively capitalized on the huge Miami hole in Game 3 and 4, forcing Spoelstra to insert his star forward in the lineup for
Game 5.
Bosh came off the bench in that game and in just 10 odd minutes, he changed the momentum with 9 points and 6 rebounds. Spoelstra never introduced him for good minutes after the break and the result was an overtime loss, putting
Miami on the brink of elimination.
After facing a lot of criticism post Game 5, Coach Spo gave Bosh added minutes from the bench in Game 6, but that really didn’t matter because James simply owned that game to tie the series.
Bosh’s significance however boiled to the fore in the series decider. Coming off the bench, Chris simply changed the mentality of the Boston defence, by sending three long range daggers through the cup three times. Two of those
shots came in the game changing fourth quarter and it stretched the court for James and Wade. Once that happened, Boston stood a chance.
Such was the impact the power forward made that LeBron candidly said in the presser afterwards that the game ball belonged to Bosh. Doc Rivers, the Celtics coach, also termed Bosh’s performance as the ‘X-factor’.
The player himself seemed humble about his exploits.
“What I’ve experienced, what I’ve seen,” Bosh said in the press conference after Game 7. “One thing that has helped me is that you never know when you’ll be able to play this game again. You never know what tomorrow brings. And
so you might as well have fun, let it all hang out and just do what you were put on this Earth to do while you’re here. And I just want to maximize my time playing this game. I know I can’t play it forever.”
The Heat now head towards Oklahoma City to take on the mighty Thunder. That series presents a two pronged challenge to Bosh in the form of Serge Ibaka and Kendrick Perkins. He lost the battle against Tyson Chandler and the Dallas
Mavericks big last time around; whether he will be able to tough this challenge out remains to be seen.
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