Wade and James carry Miami Heat to a 103-92 win over Minnesota Timberwolves: NBA Recap
Miami Heat overcame a slow start to the game to drop the Minnesota Timberwolves 103-92 here at the American Airlines Arena on Tuesday night.
Dwyane Wade scored 24 points; LeBron James gave a full court performance with 22 points, 11 assists, 6 rebounds and 4 blocks, while Chris Bosh added 15 points.
Kevin Love once again gave a strong performance in the paint. He hauled down 18 rebounds to go along with his 11 points. Andrei Kirilenko led the Wolves with a team high 22 points, Nikola Pekovic posted a double-double with 18
points and 12 rebounds, and Luke Ridnour chipped in with 13 points.
Heat were outrebounded 53-24 by the Wolves, but they more than made up for it by connecting on 13 of their 25 shots from downtown compared to a 4 of 17 three point shooting by the Timberwolves.
James crossed the 20 points mark for 27th straight regular season game and 43rd overall, where as Minnesota were missing the services of their star guard Ricky Rubio who did not feature tonight. Although the
Spaniard has recovered from his knee injury but Rick Adelman does not want to put too much work load on him, in fear of aggravating the injury.
Bosh nailed a three pointer to put Heat up 6-2 but it was Timberwolves who had the upper hand early on. Kirilenko dunked one in to tie the score on 12 and it was close for most of the passage. Chalmers fired one from behind the
arc to put the Heat up 17-16 before the Wolves closed the quarter with a 7 nil spurt to go up 27-21.
Pekovic made a layup early in the second period to push the Wolves up 31-22, however Miami were nearby and Mike Miller sank a three pointer to make it 29-33 for the Heat. Dante Cunningham made a layup as the Wolves raced to 38-29
but Heat came back later in the period to tie the score on 47. Chalmers then beat the buzzer with a shot from behind the arc to put Heat up 52-49 at halftime.
Wolves kept it close early in the second half and Love made a layup to tie the score on 55. But the Heat started pulling ahead and a 9-0 run capped off by a James shot from downtown made it 71-63. Miami were leading 80-72 by the
end of the period.
A 6 nil spurt at the start of the final quarter put Heat in firm control. To top that that the hosts kept on doing damage from distance. Battier's shot from three point land had the Heat up 97-78 at one stage, before the Wolves
scored some consolation points.
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