Heat’s series lead down to 3-2 after Game 5 loss to Knicks in New York. Takeaways and details

Miami Heat players spoke Wednesday morning about how tough of a task it would be to end the New York Knicks’ season at Madison Square Garden.

They were right.

The Heat could not complete the job, letting its first of three opportunities to win the second-round series go to waste in a 112-103 loss to the Knicks in Game 5 on Wednesday night at Madison Square Garden. The Heat’s series lead is down to 3-2.

The Heat’s next opportunity to close out the Knicks and punch its ticket to the Eastern Conference finals will be in Game 6 on Friday in Miami. The Heat is 4-0 at home during this year’s playoffs.

“It’s the playoffs and we’re playing against a good opponent,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said after Wednesday’s defeat. “Nothing is easy in the playoffs, you have to earn everything. We expected this to be tough and they played well.”

After a back-and-forth first half, the Knicks blew Game 5 open with a dominant third quarter.

The Knicks opened the second half on a big 23-7 run to turn a three-point halftime lead into a 19-point lead with 5:55 left in the third quarter. During what proved to be a game-deciding stretch, the Heat shot just 1 of 6 from beyond the arc.

Those three-point struggles proved to be a game-long trend for the Heat on Wednesday. Miami started 3 of 22 (13.6 percent) from three-point range before making a few in the fourth quarter to finish the loss 13 of 43 (30.2 percent) from beyond the arc.

But the Heat still managed to claw its way back, closing the third quarter on a 20-11 run to cut the deficit to 10 entering the fourth quarter.

The Heat eventually trimmed the deficit to just two points with 2:37 to play. That’s the closest Miami would get.

Knicks center Isaiah Hartenstein scored on a dunk on the next possession to push the lead to four with 2:07 left. Then after Duncan Robinson missed a three for the Heat, Knicks forward RJ Barrett was fouled and made two free throws to put the Heat in a six-point hole with 1:58 remaining.

After cutting the Knicks’ lead to two, the Heat scored just two points over the final 2:37 of the game.

“We fought back,” Spoelstra said. “Games are long, but we were never able to fully get over the hump.”

The Knicks were led by guard Jalen Brunson, who finished with a game-high 38 points on 12-of-22 shooting from the field, 4-of-10 shooting from three-point range and 10-of-12 shooting from the foul line while playing every second of Game 5. He scored 10 points in the fourth quarter.

Heat star Jimmy Butler wasn’t his usual dominant self, but was still effective with 19 points on 5-of-12 shooting from the field, seven rebounds, nine assists, two blocks and four steals in 43 minutes. It went down as Butler’s lowest-scoring game of this year’s playoffs, so far.

Heat center Bam Adebayo finished with 18 points and eight rebounds.

The Knicks outscored the Heat 29-16 at the foul line to overcome a sloppy 19-turnover performance.

“They played desperate, they played hard, made shots and that always helps,” Butler said of the Knicks. “Now we got to get back home and protect home court.”

Five takeaways from the Heat’s Game 5 loss to the Knicks on Wednesday:

After a historically efficient three-point shooting performance in the first round, the Heat’s outside shooting has regressed in the second round.

Besides Butler’s greatness, one of the biggest keys behind the Heat’s dominance over the top-seeded Milwaukee Bucks in the first round of the playoffs was its incredible three-point shooting.

The Heat shot 45 percent from three-point range in the first round to become one of only five teams in NBA history to shoot 45 percent or better from three-point range on at least 150 attempts over five games in a playoff series.

But the Heat’s three-point shooting has regressed in the second round.

Including Wednesday’s 13-of-43 (30.2 percent) display from three-point range, the Heat is shooting just 63 of 202 (31.2 percent) from beyond the arc through the first five games of the second round.

Heat sharpshooters Max Strus (4 of 10 on threes) and Robinson (5 of 10 on threes) combined to shoot 9 of 20 (45 percent) from deep in Game 5. The problem is the rest of the Heat’s roster combined to shoot just 4 of 23 (17.4 percent) on threes.

The good news for the Heat is many of the threes it missed on Wednesday were open. The bad news for the Heat is it just didn’t make enough of the open threes it generated.

“Would that have changed things if we had knocked down a few of those open looks? It potentially could have,” Spoelstra said. “But you got to find a way to win even if you’re not knocking down wide open threes.”

Was the Heat’s hot shooting in the first round an anomaly or is the cold shooting in the second round an outlier?

The truth is the answer is probably in between these two extremes, but Miami was one of the worst three-point shooting teams in the NBA during the regular season. The Heat closed the regular season with the league’s fourth-worst team three-point percentage at 34.4 percent.

The Heat turned to hack-a-Mitchell Robinson and some zone late in the game as it attempted to complete the comeback. But it didn’t work.

Trailing by six points, the Heat fouled Robinson with 5:17 left in the fourth quarter. Robinson made one of two free throws to push the Knicks’ lead to seven points.

After Adebayo hit a jumper on the other end to cut the deficit to five, Miami again fouled Robinson on the ensuing possession with 4:47 to play. Robinson hit both free throws to increase the Knicks’ lead to seven.

Robinson entered shooting just 30.4 percent from the foul line in this year’s playoffs and 3 of 12 (25 percent) from the foul line through the first four games of the series. But he was 3 of 4 in this hack-a-Robinson situation and later hit one of two free throws with 21.3 seconds to play to help the Knicks hold on for the Game 5 win.

The Heat also pulled out its zone defense for seven possessions in the second half to try to slow the Knicks’ offense after not playing zone in the first half. While the Heat cut the Knicks’ 19-point lead all the way down to two late in the fourth quarter, there wasn’t much Miami did that slowed Brunson.

Brunson shot 8 of 12 in the paint and drew 10 fouls to finish 10-of-12 from the foul line in Game 5.

“He has a great competitive will,” Spoelstra said of Brunson. “He’s going to continue to attack, he’s going to try to manipulate the defense. He’s aggressive, he’s physical, but he also knows how to draw fouls. He’s clever, so he has that combination.”

Along with Brunson, the Knicks also got a 26-point effort from Barrett and a 24-point effort from Julius Randle.

Both teams played some of their most important players big minutes in this important game.

Brunson and Quentin Grimes played every second of Game 5 for the Knicks as they fought off elimination.

Butler logged 43 minutes on Wednesday and played the entire second half for the Heat. Instead of going to the bench for his usual second-half rest at the start of the fourth quarter, Spoelstra left Butler in the game the entire way as the Heat worked to complete the late-game rally that ultimately fell short.

“We had finally a little bit of momentum there at the end of the third quarter,” Spoelstra said of his decision to play Butler for the entire fourth quarter. “I did have that inclination to maybe get him out at some point. But I think that fourth quarter was probably the best quarter of the game, both ways and I just wanted to see if we could take the lead and see if that momentum would change. But we were never able to do that.”

Some of the Heat’s success in the playoffs and in this second-round series could be attributed to winning the non-Butler minutes. But Miami couldn’t win those minutes in Game 5.

The Heat entered Wednesday outscoring opponents by 37 points in the 130 minutes that Butler has not been on the court in the playoffs.

Through the first four games of this second-round series, the Heat had outscored the Knicks by six points in 71 non-Butler minutes.

This is especially noteworthy because the Heat was outscored by 2.7 points per 100 possessions without Butler on the court in the regular season.

On Wednesday, it looked like the regular season because the Heat could not survive the minutes that Butler spent on the bench.

The Knicks outscored the Heat by nine points in the 5:17 that Butler wasn’t on the court in Game 5. These were an important five minutes, too.

Butler went to the bench with the Heat ahead by 10 points entering the second quarter. By the time Butler re-entered the game with 6:43 left in the quarter, the Knicks had outscored the Heat 18-9 to cut the deficit to just one point and end Miami’s early momentum.

“Our second unit, we didn’t come out with any type of fire today and we kind of let them get back in the game and they took advantage from that point,” Heat reserve guard Kyle Lowry said. “We were up 10 to start the second. I think we missed some shots and we let them get a little bit comfortable. But they did their job, they protected home court and we got to respond on Friday.”

The Heat’s bench still managed to outscore the Knicks’ reserves 42-8 on Wednesday.

The Heat did not take advantage of its first of three close-out opportunities on Wednesday after building a 3-1 series lead over the Knicks. But the odds are still on Miami’s side.

Entering this year’s playoffs, teams that lead a best-of-7 series 3-2 have gone on to win the series 83.9 percent of the time (281-54).

The Heat’s second close-out opportunity will come in Game 6 on Friday in Miami (7:30 p.m., ESPN).

There’s no doubt that more pressure will be on the Heat to close out the series on Friday because a Knicks win in Game 6 would force a Game 7 in New York on Monday.

The odds would then be on the Knicks’ side. Entering this year’s playoffs, home teams have won Game 7 of a best-of-7 series 75.9 percent of the time (110-35).