MIAMI (AP) -With the way lockers are assigned in the Miami Heat dressing room, Michael Beasley, Mario Chalmers and Daequan Cook are all on opposite sides of the circular space.
So it’s not uncommon, when the trio is getting dressed after games, for them to be incessantly shouting at each other – about where they’ll go to dinner, whose turn it is to pay, who has the cooler dog, who’ll be driving whose car, who’s got the better clothes and plenty of other topics that college-age guys find important.
“It’s like they’re kids,” said Heat star Dwyane Wade, who at 26 has become one of the team’s graybeards.
If they were so inclined, Beasley, Chalmers and Cook could all still be playing college basketball. But each came out early and found their way to Miami, transforming what was one of the league’s older rosters into one of the youngest. They’ve also helped the Heat get off to a 17-13 start that has thrown the NBA’s worst team last season thickly back into the Eastern Conference playoff picture.
Indeed, these young players are all right.
“Sometimes it drives me nuts,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “They’re totally fearless, at times overconfident, but there’s never any fear where they’re shying away from the situation. The three of them … they all should still be in college. Rio is the elder statesman of the three. Daequan is a junior and Michael should be a sophomore, and Daequan and Michael haven’t even played that many games in college.”
That didn’t show on Tuesday.
Chalmers and Cook combined to shoot 11-for-14 from 3-point range, and the trio combined for 46 points in helping the Heat beat Cleveland 104-95 – just the fifth loss in 31 games this season for the Cavaliers.
Chalmers, who hit the 3-pointer that forced overtime in Kansas’ NCAA title win over Memphis last season, was such a factor Tuesday that Wade insisted he appear on the team’s postgame broadcast as the star of the game. And he can still shoot, which he proved again against Cleveland, but is very much a pass-first guy with Miami, especially with Wade, Shawn Marion and Udonis Haslem to feed the ball to.
“I still survey the floor as a point guard,” said Chalmers, who at this rate could enter the mix with Derrick Rose and O.J. Mayo for top-rookie honors. “It’s my job to get other people their shot, but if I get my shot, I’m going to take it.”
Chalmers played 40 minutes on Tuesday with eight assists and no turnovers against a team thought by many as one of the very few who can challenge Boston for East supremacy. Cook shot a ridiculous 54 percent from 3-point range in December. Beasley is now focused on playing defense for the first time in his life and is drawing high praise.
If this is a building season for the Heat, meet three of the building blocks.
“We hang out all the time,” Cook said. “Almost all day, every day, the three of us and Joel Anthony, too. We’re always together.”
Those bonds show on the court.
Each says he gets more confidence from the other two. Chalmers is probably the most quiet of the three, yet won the starting job alongside Wade in the Heat backcourt before the season and looks very much like he could be the team’s point guard for years. Beasley says his game is getting more complete every day. Cook has forgotten much of last season, parts of which he languished on the bench and craved minutes – which didn’t come because he was considered a defensive liability.
Now the Heat think so much of Cook’s defense that he guarded LeBron James in each of the teams’ meetings this week.
So if they play like this, Wade can overlook a little locker room exuberance.
“Sometimes I feel like I’m carrying my sons around, I swear,” Wade said. “But they make it all worthwhile, coming in every day and seeing the new challenges they’re going to bring. These young guys, I haven’t seen anything like them, but we need them. They’re very big for us and you’ve got to make sure you give them their confidence but stay on them as well.”
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