MIAMI — There is no dancing around it: Mike Budenholzer is out as coach of the Milwaukee Bucks because his team lost in the first round of the playoffs to the Miami Heat.

As plain and simple as that (even though there assuredly will be those insisting on higher truths, now free to put the entirety of the Bucks’ season under their microscope for a few gotcha moments).

But also consider that the Bucks played 2 1/2 of the five games against the Heat without Giannis Antetokounmpo.

To a degree, that makes the dismissal of Budenholzer tinged with a touch of hubris from Milwaukee management, as if to say that they put together a roster strong enough that it shouldn’t require the presence of a two-time NBA Most Valuable Player.

Then consider how a simple moment in time, a moment on April 11, likely contributed as much as any factor to Budenholzer today no longer being coach of the Bucks.

That was when the Heat lost to the Atlanta Hawks in the opening game of the play-in tournament.

With a victory that night, the Heat would have been the No. 7 seed, left to face the Boston Celtics in the opening round, out of the Bucks’ side of the Eastern Conference bracket.

Or even consider another moment in time, one on April 14.

That’s when, despite trailing in the fourth quarter, the Heat pushed past the Chicago Bulls in an all-or-nothing second-chance play-in game.

Had the Bulls held on, it would have been Bucks-Bulls in the first round. And, with all due respect to DeMar DeRozan and Zach LaVine, a far different outcome for Budenholzer’s team.

So the question then becomes whether Budenholzer would have been out had his team lost in the second round or the East finals. Or was it because the Heat carried that scarlet number of being a No. 8 seed that it became an all-or-nothing series for the 2015 and ’19 NBA Coach of the Year, winner of the 2021 NBA title?

Mostly it stands as the latest example of the NBA regular season being the most meaningless of exercises when it comes to contenders, with the Bucks, at 58-24, closing with the NBA’s best record.

By contrast, the Heat and Los Angeles Lakers, a pair of play-in teams, are quite comfortable at the moment with their coaching suites. The Heat closed at 44-38, the Lakers at 43-39.

Budenholzer? He had the most wins of any coach over the last five seasons.

Yes, Budenholzer long has carried the tag of not being nearly reactive enough with his postseason in-the-moment decisions.

The failure to call timeout late in regulation and overtime in the series-ending Game 5 loss to the Heat was disconcerting.

Removing the size of Brook Lopez for what turned into Jimmy Butler’s point-blank tying basket at the end of the regulation in Game 5 was perplexing (but it’s not as if Gregg Popovich didn’t have Tim Duncan off the floor for the critical Chris Bosh rebound that turned into Ray Allen’s series-defining 3-pointer for the Heat in the 2013 NBA Finals against the San Antonio Spurs).

And after Antetokounmpo helped smother Butler during the Bucks’ 4-0 sweep of the Heat in the 2021 first round, it was surprising that Giannis did not get the assignment when available in this season’s first round, with that undertaking going almost solely to Jrue Holiday.

Asked after his team was eliminated about not getting the opportunity on Butler, who averaged 37.6 points in the series. Antetokounmpo deferred.

“Out of respect,” he said, “you gotta let the coach make that adjustment. We have our best defender on him. There are conversations with Jrue. Whenever he gets tired, I can take him. He’s so competitive. He plays so hard. He wants to take the challenge. But at the end of the day, I wish I could guard him more.”

Based on where they finished in the standings, how they played in the play-in opener, how they struggled in their winner-take-all play-in second chance, the Heat were not expected to be spending this weekend hosting a second-round game against the New York Knicks.

Certainly not after drawing the No. 1-seeded Bucks in the first round.

The price of that success was the job of a coach voted twice as best in the league over the past decade.

Just another example of how the NBA regular season is little more than a march toward the only thing that matters.

IN THE LANE

AWKWARD EXIT: Apparently not everyone was disappointed to see Mike Budenholzer dismissed as Bucks coach. Former Heat forward Jae Crowder told Milwaukee’s Journal Sentinel he was confused by being reduced solely to Bucks afterthought in the playoffs. “I’ve never been in a situation like that,” he said. “Eleven years. Check my résumé. I’ve been playing. I’ve always been playing. I’m very confused as to why I was brought here. I don’t know my purpose here and why I was brought here.” Crowder, an impending free agent,  was held out of Game 4 of the series. “Yeah, I wasn’t expecting that, DNPs,” he said. “I haven’t had them in my career so why start now?”

LESSONS LEARNED: The Heat’s upset of the Bucks not only cost Budenholzer his job, but also opened eyes around the league to remaining focused on the moment at hand. “[The Bucks] were looking at winning a title, and Miami was looking at beating them,” Philadelphia 76ers coach Doc Rivers said to the Philadelphia Inquirer. “And that’s a great message. Just because you have a goal to win something, you can’t forget about the opponent in front of you.” Said 76ers forward Tobias Harris. “Through all the games, you’re seeing the competitive nature of it. But on the flip side of that, you’re seeing you can’t take any opponent lightly and you’ve really got to handle your business as soon as you step on the floor.”

LESSONS LEARNED, TOO: With the Florida Panthers ending the Boston Bruins’ record-setting season the night before his team played at the same arena, Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla said there was a TD Garden lesson to be taken. “You can learn from anything,” he said. “I think what I paid attention to was just how hard the guys played, what they put into it. And then the atmosphere, the environment of a Game 7 of a playoff game. There’s a ton you can learn from momentum, from an energy standpoint, from important plays. And so you try to just pick things from anything to learn from when you watch a group of guys trying to achieve greatness.”

ULTIMATE TEAMMATE: At each stop, including last season’s run to the NBA Finals with the Heat, veteran power forward P.J. Tucker has been regarded as the ultimate teammate. The latest evidence came with 76ers teammate Joel Embiid this past week being named MVP. That was followed by Tucker posting on Instagram. “The day I signed to the Sixers we talked about finally getting to play together and the goals we wanted to achieve. I told you I was gonna do whatever you needed to win MVP and win the world championship. Here’s to achieving one and loading on the other.”

THEIR TIME: In discussing the playoff success of Denver Nuggets guard Jamal Murray, Nuggets assistant coach David Adelman cited the postseason performance of the Heat’s Jimmy Butler. “It’s more game-plan based,” Adelman told the Denver Post. “He thrives in those situations. No different than seeing what Jimmy Butler’s doing right now in Miami. Certain guys are built for it.”

STILL GOING: In 2014, former Florida State guard Toney Douglas was part of the Miami Heat roster that went to the NBA Finals. Now 37, Douglas still is playing on a championship level, this past week winning the Portuguese Cup with Lisbon-based Benfica. Out of the NBA since 2017, Douglas has since gone on to play in Turkey, Spain, Italy, Greece, Israel and now Portugal.

NUMBER

3. Times in NBA history teams seeded No. 5 or lower have met in an NBA playoff series, with the ongoing No. 5 Knicks vs. No. 8 Heat joining the 1987 No. 6 Houston Rockets vs. No. 7 Seattle SuperSonics, and the 1994 No. 5 Utah Jazz vs. No. 8 Nuggets.