LeBron James out (rest) Saturday against Heat, unhappy with team’s recent play

For the second time in two weeks Friday, New Orleans (5-15) knocked off one of the NBA’s premier teams, beating Cleveland 114-108 in overtime.

But he’s said he’s been healthy throughout the regular season, and stated at the beginning that he wanted to play in all 82 games, something he hadn’t done in his first 12 seasons. The guard – a onetime New Orleans Hornets player – made 5 of 7 3-pointers in the quarter, including his first three attempts.

Miami is getting it done on the defensive end, allowing Eastern Conference lows of 92.6 points per game and a 41.0 field-goal percentage. The Pelicans point guard took a feed from Tyreke Evans and calmly buried the tying three pointer, sending the game into overtime.

In Wednesday’s 108-101 loss at Houston, they held the Rockets to 41.4 percent but turned the ball over a season-worst 23 times, yielding a season-high 27 points off turnovers. Jrue looked great in the second unit and with limited minutes, even though he played in the whole OT.

“I know this is a special place for Bron and the people here want to see him and I totally understand that”, Blatt said.

He recently opened up to Sports Illustrated about his connection with the Heat, and said he was thinking “about a lot of s–” during the early stages of his first season in Cleveland. Omer Asik had by far his best game of the season as well as Eric Gordon. “It can’t be that we get really focused for a Cleveland team that was in the NBA Finals, but we can’t get focused for another team that didn’t make the playoffs past year”.

“We said this was going to be the game we were going to get our mojo back”, Davis told ESPN after the win. The limber big man from Kentucky has averaged as many points in his teams’ 15 losses (23.8) as he has in the team’s five wins. “And if not, at least I put in the effort”. When you get your guys back, you prepare just as you prepare before. The Miami Heat have won 10 of their last 13 home games. Anthony Davis had 29 points and 13 rebounds to lead the Pelicans. But only once – the Cavs’ 102-92 win back on October 30 in Cleveland – have James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh all played in the same game.

It was clear James pushed his body to the limits, scoring near-20 points in the fourth quarter alone, and 37 points altogether by the time the night was over. “Now it’s about being consistent with our level of (play) and whoever comes in here, we’ve got to play the same way”.