Kevork Djansezian / pool via Reuters file

The Heat need to be seeing a lot more dunks by Shaquille O'Neal in the second half of the season.

Centers get the glory, but they don’t win titles, not all by themselves. There are too many ways to stop one man whose game does not wander far outside the paint. We saw that many years ago when Wilt Chamberlain was the greatest player in the game but kept losing titles to Bill Russell, who had a far greater team around him with the Celtics than did Chamberlain.

And we’ve seen it in Shaq’s career. Not until he teamed up with Bryant did he reap the championships that seemed inevitable when he came into the league from LSU. The spotlight has been on him, but in his title years, he’s always had help carrying the load.

Now the help is gone.

There’s little margin for error, just a small cushion over the Nets, who are a better team than they’ve shown so far this year. Another game back are the Knicks, playing better as the season progresses.

It’s been a long time since an NBA champion has missed the playoffs the next year. But if Shaq can’t stay healthy and carry them to the finish line, that’s not just what can happen, it’s what will happen.

He’s not a kid anymore. His scoring is down as well as his rebounding. They’re not down a lot, but the decline is clear in the statistics. And now he has to reverse that trend and be a bigger presence than he’s been asked to be in years.

He doesn’t have another superstar to lean on. It’s all on his shoulders.

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