MIAMI — Well, you can’t say the Heat weren’t stoked for this one, despite the fact that there were 9 1/2 games separating themselves from the Knicks in the conference standings before the ball was ever tipped.
“It felt like a playoff game,” point guard Mario Chalmers said. “That’s what I was telling [teammate] Juwan Howard, that it felt just like Game 6 of the Finals. We were out there playing hard just trying to do our best job to win.”
That was the thinking up and down the Heat locker room after they disposed of the Knicks 102-88 in both teams’ final games before the All-Star break.
“The atmosphere here was great tonight because of all the hype for the game, but we approached it the same way we do any other game,” rookie guard Norris Cole said. “We just wanted to come in and execute our game plan.”
They did that. The Big Three did what the Big Three is supposed to do, combining for 65 points and setting the tone on defense, and everyone else followed the lead of LeBron James (20 points, nine rebounds, eight assists, five steals), Dwyane Wade (22 points, five assists, two steals) and Chris Bosh (25 points, eight boards).
Mostly, they suffocated Jeremy Lin, the player who had drawn so much attention in recent weeks that even the Heat (27-7) managed to spend some time flying under the radar. The Knicks fell to 17-18.
“We have to be able to stop him, in a sense, before we can worry about the other guys,” Wade said. “I think our guards did a great job putting pressure on him, making him see different things, with different guys guarding him. Then when he would get around the basket we have playmakers, guys around the rim, making it tough on him.
“He can pick you apart if you let him see the floor,” Wade added. “We did a decent job of not letting him do that.”
Said Chalmers: “We just played by our regular defensive rules. We tried to pick him up fullcourt and just keep a body on him the whole time.”
michael.vaccaro@nypost.com