MIAMI _ The deficit already was in double digits midway through the fourth quarter when Hassan Whiteside walked to the bench with shoulders slumped during a timeout, as teammates Tyler Johnson and Josh Richardson discussed a defensive assignment gone bad.
Increasingly, that has become the look of the Miami Heat, a middling team lacking a winning edge.
Fifty-five seconds later, Erik Spoelstra was forced to call another timeout.
So make it six losses in the last nine games, this time 111-99 Wednesday night to the Los Angeles Clippers team that lost in Dallas 20 hours earlier, the Heat now two games under. 500 at home as well as two games under .500 in the standings.
"They took control," Spoelstra said of the Clippers. "And then we had breakdown after breakdown defensively."
Coming off a 1-3 road trip and faced with an impending two-game swing back into the frigid north, this was a night that was supposed to offer refuge.
But for a team without a true leading man, there was no ample counter to the 31 points of Clippers forward Tobias Harris, or the late force of Clippers backup center Montrezl Harrell.
So even with a new lineup that had Tyler Johnson in and Rodney McGruder out, the sustained mediocrity was sustained.
"It seems every possession somebody was unable to sustain what they were supposed to do," Spoelstra said.
After it was tied 54-54 at halftime, the Heat went into the fourth quarter down 77-72. The Clippers then moved to the game's first double-digit lead, at 84-74, with 9:07 to play, eventually stretching the edge to 18 and avenging a previous loss to the Heat in December at Staples Center.
Whiteside closed with 22 points and 16 rebounds for the Heat.
