13–3. The Grizzlies' offensive surge caught everyone by surprise.
Everyone had expected this to be a back-and-forth battle, but judging by the current situation, the Grizzlies had no intention of letting the Heat drag the game into the closing minutes.
Spoelstra had to turn things around now. Though it was only the first quarter, as an old rival of the Grizzlies, Spoelstra knew full well that once the Grizzlies opened up a lead, the Heat would be in an extremely passive position no matter how much time remained.
It was easy for the Grizzlies to erase a deficit, but for a team trailing the Grizzlies, catching up was incredibly difficult.
If the Heat still wanted to win this game, they had to close the gap as quickly as possible.
At the moment, pure team offense was doing nothing against the Grizzlies' defense.
So, Spoelstra had to return to the Big Three-era model of using superstars to drive the offense.
"Jimmy, I need you to be more active on offense from here on out. We have to cut into the lead before the first quarter ends. Only then will we have the capital to go toe-to-toe with the Grizzlies."
Spoelstra looked at Butler, who silently nodded.
He had long guessed things would turn out this way.
Though Link was strong, Butler had no choice now but to give it everything he had.
Besides being tough enough, Butler had another trait: he never feared powerful opponents.
Back when he was still a hotheaded rookie with the Grizzlies, he had given the mighty LeBron James enormous trouble in the Finals.
If he had been afraid, he never would have been able to contain James back then.
The word fear had never existed in Butler's dictionary, not even when facing Link.
The electronic buzzer