Game Preview: Knicks at Heat, October 26, 2025

The Knicks close March out at the World’s Most Famous Arena.

Summarized by AI ⓘ

What is the story about?

The Knicks (2-0) hit the road for the first time in 2025-26, heading down to South Beach to start a three-game road trip against the Miami Heat (1-1) in a rekindling of a rivalry that, while peaking in the 1990s, still has animosity to this day.

The Heat lost in a close, high-scoring battle to open the season on Wednesday against the Orlando Magic, but rebounded to beat the breaks off the Memphis Grizzlies 146-114 on Friday. Through two games, the Heat are averaging 133.5 points a night on 51.3% from

the field and 41.3% from three! They have also forced 35 turnovers in two games and held their opponents to shooting 43.2% from the field and 33.3% from deep.

It’ll be interesting to see how the Knicks, who put together two strong defensive performances against the Cleveland Cavaliers and Boston Celtics to open the season, will look to stop a surprisingly stout Heat offense. Winning the possession battle has been key in the early going, but the Heat are one of three teams averaging more rebounds than the Knicks.

What you’d love to see from this game is a more complete offensive performance. The Knicks are 29th in the league in FG% in the early going, shooting a miserable 40.7% from the field. This is likely just a small sample size playing tricks on us all, but the team needs to shape up. While Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Towns have been doing their things, the team needs someone else to step up, as aside from OG Anunoby’s strong effort against Cleveland, there’s been no other Knick to score more than 15 in a game.

Projected Starters

Davion Mitchell is a dynamo defensively who will almost certainly be assigned the role of Brunson stopper tonight. Ja Morant was horrendous on Friday against the Heat, going 4-for-16 with Mitchell mostly on his hip. He had a magnificent 16-12-6 outing against Orlando, but only scored two points against Memphis. He’s never been known as an elite shooter, but he did nail 44.7% of his threes in 30 games with the Heat last year and was electric in the Play-In Tournament.

We all know who Norman Powell is. He’s spent his career as the definition of a microwave scorer, averaging 17.6 points a game since 2019-20. He was finally a full-time starter for the Clippers last year and had a strong case to make his first all-star team, averaging 21.8 points on 48.4/41.8/80.4 shooting splits. Since arriving in Miami in July via trade, he’s done more of the same, being the Heat’s lead guard with Tyler Herro on the shelf. I’d guess he’ll have Mikal Bridges hounding him all night.

Andrew Wiggins was the main piece the Heat acquired in last year’s Jimmy Butler blockbuster, and the former No. 1 overall pick has been solid, averaging 19.0 points and 4.2 rebounds on solid efficiency after the trade last year. Through two games, the Canadian wing has only attempted 20 shots and is 1-for-6 from three, but he’s been a good three-point shooter for the last few years.

Bam Adebayo is the feature name on this Heat squad with his three All-Star games, five All-Defense teams, and his superstar wife, who’s challenging to be the WNBA’s GOAT. Last year, he started shooting more threes and made them at a 35.7% clip. As he looks to Brook Lopez-ify his game, he’s nailed five threes in 13 attempts from behind the arc already while averaging 19.5 points and 8.5 rebounds. He’s a good bet for 20 every night, especially with Herro out.

Yves Missi has been very impressive in his first year-plus in the NBA. The former No. 15 pick showed flashes as a rookie, averaging 9.3 points and 7.4 rebounds in 64 games (36 starts). He can shoot the three, but the seven-footer is a beast under the basket if you don’t have, say, Mitchell Robinson under there. He had a 12-8-6 performance against the Knicks in March and can make a big leap this year.

Prediction

This will depend a lot on the status of the injured Knicks. It looks like Josh Hart will go, but both Deuce McBride (personal reasons) and Karl-Anthony Towns (quad) are questionable. There’s still no Mitchell Robinson, and with the double big lineups that the Heat run, you wonder if Ariel Hukporti will start tonight regardless of the personnel available.

The Heat have a sneaky amount of firepower, and it’ll be key not to let guys like Nikola Jovic, Simone Fontecchio, and Jaime Jaquez Jr. beat you off the bench. Still, after beating two teams that should finish higher than the Heat in the standings, I’m going to trust that the Knicks will improve to 3-0 for the first time since 2012-13.

Knicks by 6.