Heat center Jermaine O'Neal is vowing to play through a broken nose.

He broke his nose late in Miami's win over Chicago on Sunday night.

"I tried to wear a mask and basically had a bad two, three minutes of not being able to see out of the sides," O'Neal told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. "I could only see forward. So I took it off. I'm one to believe if you wear a mask in a game, you're going to get hit."

O'Neal was thrilled to learn that a concussion didn't accompany the broken nose. He sat out two games in the playoffs this past season with one.

"I was a little bit nervous, obviously having a concussion before," he admitted. "I had some of the symptoms of a concussion, as far as blurriness in the vision and a headache, and my balance was a little bit off.

"It cleared up pretty fast and that's why I just tried to look into the lights, to make sure, because normally when you have a concussion, you can't look into the light. That's when I knew I was fine and started concentrating a little but more on the nose."