The Miami Heat will try to avenge an earlier defeat to the Sacramento Kings on Monday night but will have to do so without the suspended Jimmy Butler when they tip off a six-game road trip.
Butler had 27 points for the Heat on Nov. 4, but it wasn’t enough as Domantas Sabonis hit a buzzer-beating jumper to lift the Kings to a 111-110 win in Miami. Sabonis finished with 16 point and 16 rebounds.
The rematch will similarly catch the Kings in a positive mood while the Heat have been trending in a negative direction.
A little less than two weeks since head coach Mike Brown was fired, the Kings have won four in a row under interim coach Doug Christie.
The fourth of the wins came in impressive fashion Sunday night, when Sacramento blitzed the rival Golden State Warriors 129-99 on the road despite De’Aaron Fox sitting out with a bruised right glute.
Fox, who had a game-high 28 points in the earlier win in Miami, remains a question mark for the second night of Sacramento’s back-to-back set. He took a hard fall in Friday’s 138-133 home win over the Memphis Grizzlies.
With or without Fox, DeMar DeRozan sees a lot of guys pulling on the rope these days.
“We all want to win; we’re all competitors,” DeRozan said. “We all hated when we were in the slump that we were in. The only way out of that was to stick together. The only way to get out of stuff like that was to pull together and to pull through it. I think that’s just where we’re at right now.”
Malik Monk (26 points) and Sabonis (22 points) had big offensive games at Golden State, but Christie was most pleased with a defensive effort that held a third opponent in the last four games to 107 or points or less.
“That is our identity; that is what we’re searching for,” Christie said. “So when we continue to go out and touch people and be an irritant, that’s really what defense is about. It’s positioning schemes; yeah, I get all that. But it’s who wants to continue on it, who wants the ball the most, who’s willing to go the furthest and get dirty.”
The Heat will begin their Western swing without Butler, who was suspended for seven games last week for conduct detrimental to the team. Pending a successful appeal, Butler will miss the entire trip after already having been banned from Saturday’s 136-100 home drubbing at the hands of the Utah Jazz.
As the Heat players packed their bags for the long trip, Tyler Herro noted the first thing necessary was to let the road write a different story.
“(The Utah game) obviously wasn’t how we imagined it or pictured it,” Herro said. “You try to put this one past you. Just trying to bring that collective spirit that we can rally around each other for almost two weeks out on that road trip.”
The Heat also will visit Golden State, Utah, Portland and both Los Angeles teams on the 10-day venture.
