NBA - 501 Miami Heat @ 502 Oklahoma City Thunder
Projected line: 191 points | Oklahoma City by 1 point
The matchup between the Miami Heat and the Oklahoma City Thunder is truly exciting and it has the potential to be one of the best finals of the last years. Oklahoma City is the favorite to win it all but I don't agree with the series prices that shows OKC at -180 and MIA at +160,as in my opinion the Heat has more chances to win the championship than the +160 odds show.
For this contest, we are talking about one “rested” team against one team that is coming from a 7-game series, so the rested team will have a major physical edge in this game 1. In this playoffs there were 3 similar situations: LAL played 7 games vs DEN and then faced OKC; LAC played 7 games vs MEM and then faced SAS and BOS played 7 games vs. PHI and then faced MIA. All these three teams were stomped in the first game of their respective series losing by almost 20 points per game. However, there is a major difference between those 3 teams and the Heat for this contest: unlike those teams, the Heat had 2 days off to prepare tonight’s game in comparison with the just one day that those teams had! This little detail is huge and makes all the difference and also a trip from MIA to OKC is relatively a short trip.
The Thunder offense has been unstoppable in these playoffs! Amazingly they have been even better than the Dallas Mavericks from last season. OKC offensive ratings so far: 114.7 vs. Dallas LY: 114.6! Despite facing 10 of the 13 previous NBA Champions (Dallas, LA Lakers and San Antonio), the Thunder offense is yet to face a defense capable of causing some problems to them in a way the Heat surely will cause.
OKC offense is prone to commit turnovers, they were the NBA’s most turnover-prone team in the regular season, but they are turning the ball over on just 9.5 percent of their possessions in the playoffs, a rate that would have been the second lowest this season. OKC made some nice improvements in this department but I just can’t ignore the fact that Dallas, Lakers and the Spurs are all poor pressure defensive teams that don’t force turnovers while Miami is on another level.
Reg. Season numbers – Opp. TO/rate:
#14 Dallas w/13.87%
#30 Lakers w/10.67%
#24 San Antonio w/12.93%
…
#3 Miami w/15.78%
Also Miami despite not having a powerful interior dominant force, they are one of the best teams in defending at the rim, as they were #2 in this department during the regular season and this combination between pressuring the ball handler and closing the gaps quickly near the basket is what a team needs to do slow down OKC.
Russell Westbrook is having a great postseason, but he really doesn’t have opposition so far: Jason Kidd was too slow to defend him; Ramon Sessions is inexperienced and far away from the quality of Westbrook in both ends of the floor while Tony Parker had to work so hard on the offensive end that he just couldn’t match the same energy on the defensive end. On the other side, the Miami Heat will throw different players to defend Westbrook. At some points I even expect LeBron James to guard Russ in some moments. Note that in two regular season games against Miami, Westbrook went 4-16FG & 9-26 from the field!
However, OKC defense is also excellent and will make Miami sweat to score against them. Their 2 frontcourt players Ibaka and Perkins will make hard the Heat’s penetrations to the basket, in the 2 h2h reg. season games, the Heat shot 13-19 & 15-31 FG at the rim, so Miami will have to battle hard and eventually go to the free throw line.
Sefolosha will likely defend Dwayne Wade and again Wade will have to play hard in order to score against OKC. The Celtics decided to double team Wade in the series with success until Chris Bosh arrived… I don’t think that OKC will adapt the same BOS strategy because with Bosh on the floor, Miami had a legit scorer on the front.
I also expect this series to be a slow paced series. OKC will hardly use any kind of small ball lineup not only because I think that Scott Brooks believes that their frontcourt is better than Miami’s frontline, but mainly because without two big players on the floor, Miami will have better chances to score at the rim – something that OKC surely doesn’t want that, so they will play big! In Game 7, Miami crushed the Celtics in the fourth quarter while using both Bosh and Haslem so this will be the Heat tandem at the front.
I expect this contest to be a tight game played in a relatively slow pace and under these circumstances I’m taking Miami and the Under today.
For this contest, we are talking about one “rested” team against one team that is coming from a 7-game series, so the rested team will have a major physical edge in this game 1. In this playoffs there were 3 similar situations: LAL played 7 games vs DEN and then faced OKC; LAC played 7 games vs MEM and then faced SAS and BOS played 7 games vs. PHI and then faced MIA. All these three teams were stomped in the first game of their respective series losing by almost 20 points per game. However, there is a major difference between those 3 teams and the Heat for this contest: unlike those teams, the Heat had 2 days off to prepare tonight’s game in comparison with the just one day that those teams had! This little detail is huge and makes all the difference and also a trip from MIA to OKC is relatively a short trip.
The Thunder offense has been unstoppable in these playoffs! Amazingly they have been even better than the Dallas Mavericks from last season. OKC offensive ratings so far: 114.7 vs. Dallas LY: 114.6! Despite facing 10 of the 13 previous NBA Champions (Dallas, LA Lakers and San Antonio), the Thunder offense is yet to face a defense capable of causing some problems to them in a way the Heat surely will cause.
OKC offense is prone to commit turnovers, they were the NBA’s most turnover-prone team in the regular season, but they are turning the ball over on just 9.5 percent of their possessions in the playoffs, a rate that would have been the second lowest this season. OKC made some nice improvements in this department but I just can’t ignore the fact that Dallas, Lakers and the Spurs are all poor pressure defensive teams that don’t force turnovers while Miami is on another level.
Reg. Season numbers – Opp. TO/rate:
#14 Dallas w/13.87%
#30 Lakers w/10.67%
#24 San Antonio w/12.93%
…
#3 Miami w/15.78%
Also Miami despite not having a powerful interior dominant force, they are one of the best teams in defending at the rim, as they were #2 in this department during the regular season and this combination between pressuring the ball handler and closing the gaps quickly near the basket is what a team needs to do slow down OKC.
Russell Westbrook is having a great postseason, but he really doesn’t have opposition so far: Jason Kidd was too slow to defend him; Ramon Sessions is inexperienced and far away from the quality of Westbrook in both ends of the floor while Tony Parker had to work so hard on the offensive end that he just couldn’t match the same energy on the defensive end. On the other side, the Miami Heat will throw different players to defend Westbrook. At some points I even expect LeBron James to guard Russ in some moments. Note that in two regular season games against Miami, Westbrook went 4-16FG & 9-26 from the field!
However, OKC defense is also excellent and will make Miami sweat to score against them. Their 2 frontcourt players Ibaka and Perkins will make hard the Heat’s penetrations to the basket, in the 2 h2h reg. season games, the Heat shot 13-19 & 15-31 FG at the rim, so Miami will have to battle hard and eventually go to the free throw line.
Sefolosha will likely defend Dwayne Wade and again Wade will have to play hard in order to score against OKC. The Celtics decided to double team Wade in the series with success until Chris Bosh arrived… I don’t think that OKC will adapt the same BOS strategy because with Bosh on the floor, Miami had a legit scorer on the front.
I also expect this series to be a slow paced series. OKC will hardly use any kind of small ball lineup not only because I think that Scott Brooks believes that their frontcourt is better than Miami’s frontline, but mainly because without two big players on the floor, Miami will have better chances to score at the rim – something that OKC surely doesn’t want that, so they will play big! In Game 7, Miami crushed the Celtics in the fourth quarter while using both Bosh and Haslem so this will be the Heat tandem at the front.
I expect this contest to be a tight game played in a relatively slow pace and under these circumstances I’m taking Miami and the Under today.
Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 501/502 Under 195 @ -110 / 1.91 on Bookmaker
Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 501 Miami Heat (+5) @ -110 / 1.91 on Bookmaker
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