Just before the Game 3 of the NBA Finals, Dwayne Wade prophetically said in an interview that coming home to Miami did not guarantee a win for them and that they still had to play a "complete game."

The two-time defending champion team was unable to fight off the San Antonio Spurs' offensive attack in the first half of the game. For the first time this playoff season, the Miami Heat had lost in the American Airlines Arena, according to New York Daily News.

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The Spurs achieved a 111-92 win to take them to Game 4 on Thursday in the same venue. In Game 2, Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said the ball stuck too much to his players' hands in the final quarter to score only six points. This time, the ball did not stick to their hands for the first 19 minutes to give the team a load of successful shots.

San Antonio's 2-1 lead in this series owes it largely to its record-breaking first half with a 75.8 shooting (25 out of 33 shots). The Spurs began the game by making 19 out of the first 21 shots to proceed to carry them to a 25-point lead. The team's 87% shooting (13 out of 15 shots) had also set a record in the Finals.

In the third quarter, Miami managed to cut the lead to only 15 points in the third and put up a good fight in the fourth quarter. When the lead went down to only 10 with 9:00 still on the clock, Ray Allen came up with a corner three-pointer.

Unfortunately, the Heat was unable to bring down the lead to below double digits as Kawhi Leonard and Tony Parker showed off their prowess in the last 6:00 minutes of the game.

After a remarkable 35-point game in San Antonio in Game 2, LeBron James was down to only 22 points in Game 3. Wade and Chris Bosh had contributed 31 more but the Miami team finished with only four points from the break while the Spurs only had 13 turnovers.

Five of the Spurs' players scored double digits, with Leonard putting in 29, and 18 of which came from the first half. San Antonio finished the game by succeeding in 60% of all their shots. In their first 21 shots, only Tony Parker and Tim Duncan missed.

The Spurs' strategy focused on transporting the ball from one side to the other and cornering the Heat's big men in areas where defense is difficult. They were able to win Game 1 with their constant shifting, but were unable to duplicate this success in Game 2.

For Game 3, however, the Spurs' strategy worked flawlessly.

TagsGame 3