Heat vs. Pacers: Dissension in Miami Sign of Impending Implosion

After the Miami Heat defeated the Indiana Pacers 95-86 in Game 1 of their best-of-seven Eastern Conference semifinal series, many pundits already began penciling in the Heat as one of the teams that would be advancing to the Eastern Conference finals.

Now after two straight losses, the loss of power forward Chris Bosh for at least the remainder of the series and a courtside confrontation between the team's coach and star player, the Heat appear to be teetering on the verge of a full-blown meltdown, leaving those same pundits scrambling for their erasers.

The low point of the series to this point for the Heat likely came in the third quarter of Miami's 94-75 beatdown at the hands of the Pacers in Game 3, a quarter in which the Heat, who feature two of the game's best players in Dwyane Wade and LeBron James, scored all of 12 points.

Wade, who has struggled though a mediocre postseason (by his standards) while battling nagging injuries, shot only 2-of-13 from the floor in the game and then went absolutely ballistic on head coach Erik Spoelstra, hurling obscenities at the coach before being pulled away by teammates.

The team cancelled Friday's media session and practice in an effort to "circle the wagons" a bit and review game film, but ducking questions from the press and looking at game tape isn't going to fix the numerous problems that the Heat are facing.

First, as I referenced earlier, Wade has been a shell of his usually stellar self in this year's playoffs, shooting less than 43 percent from the floor after making nearly half his shots in the regular season.

Wade is the consummate clutch player and has no qualms about taking a team on his shoulders. The fact that he's seemingly physically unable to do so right now is likely incredibly frustrating, which may have led to his outburst Thursday.

The injury to Bosh has also left a huge hole in the Heat lineup. Not only are the Heat getting beaten up inside (they were out-rebounded 52-36 in Game 3), but Bosh's absence has further exposed just how woeful the Miami bench truly is. Dexter Pittman started at power forward in Game 3 for the Heat.

Dexter Pittman. Let that sink in for a second.

All this also puts a tremendous amount of pressure on LeBron James, who not only must press to score given Wade's struggles and Bosh's injury, but who must now play increased minutes and expend extra effort on the defensive end.

Never mind the fact that with Bosh out and Wade struggling at some point the Heat are going to need James to come up with some clutch plays down the stretch in this series, something that the superstar doesn't exactly have a sterling track record of doing.

None of these are exactly new problems for the Heat, as experts have been opining all season long that Miami's over-dependence on their trio of stars could come back to haunt them someday.

As Grantland's Bill Simmons points out, that day may well have come, and haunted or not, the Miami Heat are certainly acting like a scrappy Indiana Pacers team has scared the heck out of them.