MIAMI - That must have felt better.
On the heels of two straight losses at home, the Heat got a much-needed win Saturday night against Toronto.
This was no blowout, and the woeful Raptors cut it to four with six minutes left. But in Miami's 109-100 victory, LeBron James and Dwyane Wade finally found moments to play with a fluid ease and obvious chemistry.
At times, there was a sense of purpose and anger in the Heat's play, from Wade's massive throw-down late in the fourth quarter to Udonis Haslem's fourth double-double of the year to the fact six different players scored in double digits.
"Well, it was good to get a win," Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra said.
There were obvious cracks remaining in the foundation, from the inconsequentialness of Chris Bosh to the lack of toughness and killer instinct that let a poor team stage a fourth-quarter comeback.
Still, the players were focused on the good stuff. And after a win, that's a fine place to start.
"We can't go into games thinking about blowouts," Wade said. "We got to understand that teams are going to give us their best shot. We got to win ballgames, and that's what we did tonight."
A team like Toronto is there to bring out the good stuff in a squad. Saturday night, that included:
- LeBron racking up a double-double and providing a late-game throw-down of his own. His box score included 23 points and 11 assists. He attacked with vicious determination and seemed, finally, resolute on winning.
- Zydrunas Ilgauskas starting, playing almost 30 minutes - by far his most of the year - and his presence stretching the floor and adding size to an otherwise undersized team. He was a missing ingredient in the alchemy Spoelstra has been - and still is - looking to pull off.
- Wade notched 31 points, James Jones had 14 on 3-of-5 3-point shooting and Haslem was the kind of tough - as in, not a studio gangster - his team desperately needs.
Yep, there's nothing like a 2-7 Toronto team to help break a skid.
"I think we will be as good as we thought we'd be," LeBron said afterward. "But you have to put in the time."
Still, as mentioned, not everything was roses and rainbows.
On to the lingering issues that will pose more problems as the Heat play good teams:
While scoring 12 points, Bosh found himself in foul trouble and didn't play the last 12 minutes of the game. During that stretch, a lineup that included Big Z and Haslem seemed a much more effective fit for the Heat.
Which means for now Bosh remains a stranger in a strange land. The Big Three moniker continues to look like a millstone around his thin neck.
There's also the fact the Heat avoided a 5-5 start with a win that still had too many listless moments. Bad turnovers marked nearly as many moments as fantastic Big Two dunks.
Championship teams aren't schizophrenic. They're madly obsessed with imposing their will, humiliating their enemies and making a statement after a letdown.
That didn't happen, and the fact remains a win over a bad team doesn't solve these issues:
- The Heat remain undersized.
- The Heat are still not tough enough.
- The Heat do not get to play the Toronto Raptors every night for the rest of the season.
But on Saturday, at least for a night, they arrested the ugliness of their first three weeks.
Now there's three non-game days in a row - time perhaps to collect their wits, talk, bond and finally come out swinging.
"Winning cures all," Wade said. "(But we're) the same. Nothing's going to change with it. We still have a lot of things to work on in this young season. Hopefully in the next 10 games, we're a lot better than we were in these last 10."
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