MIAMI – You knew it would happen during the long NBA season. Adversity: It's something Heat head coach Erik Spoesltra has seemed to embrace during his coaching career. It's supposed to bring a team closer together and push them to work even harder and make more sacrifices for the betterment of the team.
Yet, for this year's Heat team, the first taste of adversity has seemed to just bring bigger questions.
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Let's be clear, Dwyane Wade being out is the main culprit for Miami's current three-game losing streak and struggles. You can't lose the man who sees the ball more than anyone on offense and really controls the pace of a game, and expect things not to be out of whack.
But that can't be the only defense or excuse.
We all knew Wade would miss some games at some point in the season. The problem for the Heat is that he's missing it at the worst time possible. It's early in the season and this group is still trying to learn a new system on offense and also grasp the importance of defense in this system. You couple that with injuries to Danny Granger and Josh McRoberts, and it's clear this is not the team Pat Riley built to stay a contender all season long.
So what needs to happen? For one, Chris Bosh needs to break out of this three-game slump. It's no coincidence either that Bosh has been really bad during the losing streak. And when I say bad, I don't just mean like regular bad. He was 2-of-17 from the field in Sunday's home loss to the Bucks. That's a whole other level of bad.
The positive is that it's likely just a slump because we saw the whole other level of good Bosh during the first seven games of the season. He will snap out of it. It's just awful timing that it's happening with Wade out. Or maybe it's more that Bosh is pressing because Wade is out? Either way, Bosh will bounce back.
Outside of a return to health for Wade, McRoberts and Granger, the Heat need figure things out defensively. Even with a full complement of health, this defense has not been playing on a winning level. After a good start Sunday, Milwaukee had its way in a 53-point second half.
And that's where it stands. Miami is 5-5 after 10 games. All of the challenges of a new roster is to be expected. Now comes its first major challenge. How do they deal with this adversity?
With a road game Monday in Brooklyn and a tough home game Thursday against the Clippers, the process of finding out won't be easy.