Pat Riley infamously demanded everything but the kitchen sink for him to join the Miami Heat in 1995. But besides lining his own pockets, the man known as The Godfather of the NBA, sought new challenges. It inevitably came in the form of Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls.
Riley and the Heat eventually found themselves on a collision course with the Bulls come playoff time. Pat knew Miami never had a chance, but he was also not expecting the thorough beatdown his boys received at the hands of MJ and his crew.
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Riley couldn’t hide the embarrassment
The Heat’s 1995-96 season was the worst Riley ever did as a coach until that point. He secured 16 consecutive seasons with at least 50 wins ever since he took over the reins in Los Angeles and six of those had at least 60 dubs!
That said, it was to be expected for one of the league’s newest teams. Pat had little to work with in his first year, although he had Alonzo Mourning as the cornerstone and several solid role players. Fortunately, the Heat managed to pry away Tim Hardaway from the Golden State Warriors near the trade deadline, finally giving them a live body at that position.
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Still, it wasn’t enough, especially when facing the best regular-season team of all time at that juncture. This version of the Bulls compiled 72 wins, breaking the previous record of the 1971-72 Lakers that went 69-13.
For Riley, however, the bigger issue was not about the Ls per se, but how his team responded when they were punked all over the floor.
“It was embarrassing for a professional basketball team to go to the playoff situation and got rolled,” Riles lamented in a 1997 interview with Bob Costas. “We got rolled by a team that’s simply much better than us and much more prepared than we were. So, if you take out the fact that another man or another team simply made a better effort than you to go along with their talent, then you can’t accept that.”
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“You never let another man make a better effort than you. If their game beats you, if their talent beats you, then fine. What they did was they took our heart out of us at that particular time and we didn’t play as hard as we should have played,” added Riley.
Pat set the standard
While a 42-40 team getting swept by an all-time great squad was no surprise, Pat wanted to see more fight in the Heat. Sadly, he never got it. The Bulls essentially pummeled them into submission and Riley hated that. So, he made sure that’s not going to happen again.
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“I wasn’t just gonna let this go,” Riley said, emphasizing that he would use the brutal playoff loss to motivate his team. “You never want to end the season on that note and when you end the season on that note, you got to bring that to their attention the next year and say, ‘It can’t be this way.'”
Riley did a fine job motivating the boys. They collected 61 wins themselves in 1996-97, the second-best regular season W-L record in franchise history. It was only surpassed during the Big Three era and Miami never came close to it again. They split the season series with the defending champions and fought tooth and nail in the Eastern Conference finals.
From the outside looking in, there was no shame in losing to a Bulls team that eventually won the championship. But for Riley, context should never soften the blow of a devastating defeat. Losing is one thing, but getting run off the floor? That’s a definite no-no for the man who established the Heat culture.
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This story was originally published by Basketball Network on Mar 28, 2026, where it first appeared in the Old School section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.