NBA Premium Play 01/22: Milwaukee Bucks @ Miami Heat

NBA - 805 Milwaukee Bucks @ 806 Miami Heat

Projected line: 189 points | Miami by 6 points
Miami crushed the Sixers yesterday, thanks to their evident and expected physical edge over the tired team of Philadelphia. The Heat had almost 60% of total rebounds (12-7 in offensive rebounds!). As expected, Brand was completely worn off and he had a poor game with 4-8 FG and 3reb in 26min. But worse than that, he didn't even try to guard Bosh, especially on the outside and the result was Bosh to have a huge game with 11-19 FG 30pts and 1-1 FG from 10-15 feet, 5-6 FG from 16-23 feet and 1-2 3pts! The close outs of the Sixers defense were always late and Miami shot 13-21 FG on spot up plays and 6-10 FG on cuts thanks to that.
On the other side, Philadelphia was opportunistic with their 2+1 plays. They had the expected inside struggles with 9-20 FG at the rim, but they had a good game on the outside, with 9-20 FG from 16-23 and 8-15 3pts, even though they had a bit of luck in some of those long shots!

Curiously, it's Miami's turn to be on a physical tough spot, just like Philadelphia was yesterday! I watched last night's game to help me research this game and the energy of Miami in both ends of the floor was unbelievable. However, play a back to back game is tough and even though we still have a small sample this year, the numbers don't lie and the Heat on back to back games have an average pace of 88.80 and average offensive rates of 100.3, well below their season overall average of 93.32 pace and 112.0 in offensive rates! Besides that, Milwaukee offers a tough matchup to the Heat, as they have Jackson & Delfino to defend Lebron and Mbah a Moute & Ilyasova to defend Bosh! All these four players are good defensive players, so it won't be easy for Miami to score today!

On the other side, Milwaukee is coming from a nice road win at NY against the Knicks and even though it isn't very hard to beat the Knicks nowadays, the Bucks are now healthy and their 2nd unit is good, so they can compete with the Heat deep bench tonight. Milwaukee shot 18-22 FG at the rim vs NYK and that was the key for their win, as on the outside their struggles continued with 4-16 FG from 16-23 feet. It will be impossible for Milwaukee to have such volume and especially efficiency near the basket against the great rim defense of the Heat. Miami allowed Philadelphia to shoot 9-20 FG at the rim and like I've already said several times, they are the best defensive team in the league in this area.

I expect this game to be an ugly one, as Milwaukee's head coach Scott Skiles won't want to play on the open floor with Miami and the Heat, thanks to their tough spot will struggle more than usual on offense. However, I believe Miami's great defense will keep them on the game and considering all these facts, I'll be taking both Milwaukee and the Under in here.

Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 805/806 Under 193,5 @ -110 / 1.91 on 5Dimes
Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on 805 Milwaukee Bucks (+9) @ -110 / 1.91 on Bookmaker