Miami Heat downed, but not out

The best story in the NBA doesn't involve Dirk Nowitzki or Steve Nash and it's got nothing to do with the resilient San Antonio Spurs or the surprisingly gritty Utah Jazz. In fact, let's just forget about the Western Conference for a moment.

The story that deserves our attention is taking place on the sunny shores of South Florida. It centers on three men — Pat Riley, Shaquille O'Neal and Dwyane Wade — who are destined for the Hall of Fame. Their injuries, an arthritic hip, torn knee cartilage and a separated shoulder, respectively, transformed what should have been a mundane title defense into an operatic tale with Riley, who does hyperbole better than anybody, providing voiceovers like Morgan Freeman.

It's a basketball story in three acts.

Prologue: Suffering a hangover from a summer-long celebration, the defending NBA champions aren't ready for the 2006-07 season. Riley spent most of the offseason mulling retirement from coaching and failed to add any new players while the previously inexhaustible Wade played for the U.S. national team and clearly needed a longer vacation.

Act I: O'Neal gets hurt in the fifth game. Of course it was inevitable, but the injury occurred sooner than expected. He missed 32 games after undergoing surgery to repair left knee cartilage on Nov. 19. Miami posted a 15-17 record during his absence. Since his Jan. 24 return, O'Neal, 35, has turned back the clock and is averaging 21 points and 9.5 rebounds this month.

Act II: Riley takes a hiatus. Citing a degenerative hip and knee, the 61-year-old coach takes a leave on Jan. 3 when the Heat is a disappointing 13-17. He gives control to assistant Ron Rothstein — who guides the team to a 13-9 record — then reassumes command on Feb. 21. Since his return, Riley is kinder and gentler. No more three-hour practices. No more suspensions for James Posey and Antoine Walker for not meeting the team's body-fat limits. Since his return, the Heat is 10-3.

Act III: Wade goes down. The season should have ended on Feb. 21 when the Finals MVP was wheeled off the court with a white towel draped over his dislocated shoulder. At that time, the Heat was eighth in the Eastern Conference, a half-game ahead of New Jersey and two in front of New York. It was 2-8 earlier in the season without Wade, who accounted for more than 30 percent of its offense.

Rather than opt for season-ending surgery, Wade began rehabilitation and made a bet with teammates. If you get me to the playoffs, he said, I'll get us another title.

Cue Riley.

"He's a warrior. He's a soldier. And these are his guys. The doctors are world-renowned, and they said he can go forward this way. This is what you do when you're a defending champion. He has made the decision to try to rehab it and hopefully help the team, and he should be admired for that."

Without their leader, Miami is streaking. Nine straight wins. The Heat has beaten Washington twice, Detroit, Chicago and Utah. Granted, seven of its wins have been at home, but most would have believed its record would have been 2-10 without Wade instead of 10-2.

And by all accounts, the streak shouldn't end anytime soon. Miami will be favored in its next five games. Next week, it will overtake Washington for the Southeast Division lead, and soon we'll be talking about the Heat challenging Detroit and Cleveland for the Eastern Conference title.

These things simply don't happen in the NBA.

Teams are supposed to shrivel up and die when their star players go down. Just look around the league.

Memphis piled up L's waiting for Pau Gasol's broken foot to heal. The Los Angeles Lakers became a train wreck once Lamar Odom and Luke Walton went down. Without Bobby Simmons, Milwaukee never got going and bottomed out when Michael Redd got injured. Boston's 18-game losing streak can be attributed to Paul Pierce's sprained left foot.

What did Phoenix do when Steve Nash succumbed to an achy back? They lost three of four games. And let's not mention the Sonics.

"There's only going to be like two teams that will have a successful [trouble-free] season at the end of the year," New Jersey's Richard Jefferson told reporters.

So how did the Heat overcome the loss of their leading scorer? It's simple mathematics. They improved their defense.

Only two teams have scored more than 100 points against Miami with Wade out of the lineup. Before his injury, the Heat's average defensive yield was 98.5 points per game. In the past 11 games it's 88.6.

Riley knows he can't squeeze 29 more points out of a geriatric lineup that includes six players who are at least 30 years old. But if he can get them to play defense and mimic the half-court-oriented style of his New York teams, then O'Neal is capable of carrying the Heat until Wade returns in two to three weeks.

Only there's one potential problem — the epilogue.

Because the Big Soprano is providing most of the heavy lifting now, he isn't likely to have much left in the reserves for a prolonged playoff campaign. Even with homecourt advantage in East, Miami needs a rested O'Neal in May and June if there's to be another championship parade along Biscayne Bay Boulevard.

Then again, this team is all about proving skeptics wrong.

Cue Riley.

"We've experienced an incredible journey over the last year. We're going through a lot of adversity right now, with injuries. Shaquille missed a lot of time; Dwyane is down now. With every adversity, there's a seed of equivalent benefit. It's going to be up to us to find it. So our work is ahead of us, and we're going to make a run at it."

Not just running, Miami is streaking past everyone in the East to what might be another Finals appearance.

Percy Allen: 206-464-2278 or pallen@seattletimes.com