The Miami Heat’s ’06 files: Adjusting to turbulence

Plans were scrapped after game two.

The Heat were snake-bitten by Shaquille O’Neal’s sprained right ankle on Nov. 3 against the Pacers, and his absence put tremendous stress on the players and coaches while the vibes spiraled.

“An idle Shaquille can be a challenge for a team,” The Associated Press’ Tim Reynolds told Five Reasons Sports. “While he was resting the ankle, he was still very loud, still very vocal, and not everybody always appreciated or understood Shaq’s sense of humor.”

He could have worked harder during his rehab, but he didn’t. They went 9-9 before he returned, but coach Stan Van Gundy voluntarily stepped down from his post on Dec. 12. It wasn’t the first time he had tried resigning that season, either, according to Reynolds. Van Gundy said he wanted to spend more time with his family, but there was an element of him being sick of the drama.

O’Neal’s ego and insolence were difficult to handle, and he didn’t exactly view Van Gundy as his “white father,” like he did with coach Phil Jackson in Los Angeles. 

So, Riley, the team president who had no interest in a coaching comeback and wanted to finally get on with hip replacement surgery, took over. Yet, it wasn’t smooth sailing from there.

They only had a 30-20 record before hosting the Pistons on Feb. 12, 2006. They were coming off a 36-point smackdown in Dallas three days earlier, and the Pistons had defeated them three straight times. Detroit  subsequently had a 13-point lead going into the final frame against the Heat, but the hosts pulled it off thanks to Dwyane Wade and O’Neal combining for 27 points in the fourth quarter. Gary Payton was the only other Miami player to log at least three field goals, and Riley called it a “watershed” moment as the team evolved mentally.

Toughness was in part developed by how rigorous the training was. Riley once had the team doing wall-sit exercises while pacing and giving his lecture, according to James Posey in his interview with Heat TV host and radio play-by-play man Jason Jackson. Posey also recalled that everyone was instructed to do cardio on the exercise bike after practice in front of a massive TV screen displaying every player’s information from their machine, while Riley walked around like a drill sergeant. “You can’t cheat it,” Posey said. “So he knows if you are going hard or not.”

For someone like Posey, a veteran in his seventh season, the training put him in the best shape of his life. He was already an exceptionally good defender, and being leaner helped him move quicker.  

Dwyane Wade also kept blossoming, and everything on the court ran through him, while locker room business went through O’Neal, Payton and Alonzo Mourning. Notably, O’Neal and Mourning, who turned 33 and 35 in March and February, were former rivals and came into the league in 1992 as the first and second picks. They had 19 All-Star appearances combined before the year started, and Payton had recorded nine All-NBA selections. It was a leadership group with serious credibility. 

Mourning, an intense and committed man to his craft, was particularly a hawk at practices and in the weight room, and he would not tolerate low RPMs. Anyone that showed up unprepared was going to get called out. 

The bond between Wade and O’Neal got stronger as well throughout the year. According to Mike Wallace, formerly of the Miami Herald and now with Grind City Media, some of it had to do with Shaq giving him the ‘Flash’ nickname, and Wade embracing it. 

There were “some things that Dwyane Wade took on in terms of entitlement, that was because Shaquille O’Neal came in with the already sense of entitlement, in terms of how you are going to be treated and what you are going to be doing,” Wallace told FRSN. “The Dwyane Wade that became a superstar in Miami, the seeds were planted by Shaq’s influence.”

Erik Spoelstra, an assistant coach at the time and formerly a video coordinator, played an important role in Wade’s rise, too. Heat play-by-play broadcaster Eric Reid told Five Reasons Sports Network that Spoelstra worked with Wade on every aspect of his game. 

They closed out the regular season with a 21-10 record, and seven of those losses came in April. On top of that, Mourning injured his left calf muscle and missed the last 14 games of the year. Riley wasn’t sweating the last month, and a 52-30 record was good enough for the second seed, which was 12 games behind the Pistons. 

Before their series with the Chicago Bulls started, the Associated Press reported that Riley spent four days in his home state, New York, with his sick mother, Mary, who was age 96. He came back to Miami two days before Game 1.