The Atlanta Hawks and Miami Heat linked up on Sunday afternoon in Miami in a Game 1 that the underdogs would rather forget. The Heat rode hot shooting and relentlessness to capture a relatively easy 115-91 victory over the Hawks.
Atlanta immediately found Miami’s swarming team defense difficult to break down, and that labored to create open chances all game long. Miami faced less resistance on the opposite end, and began burying the Hawks with ball movement and spacing. The game quickly became uncompetitive and remained that way until the final buzzer mercifully sounded, with the Heat just a few first quarter minutes from recording a wire-to-wire triumph.