{"id":14474,"date":"2011-03-27T13:14:10","date_gmt":"2011-03-27T18:14:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=14474"},"modified":"2011-03-27T13:14:10","modified_gmt":"2011-03-27T18:14:10","slug":"battle-in-south-beach-houston-rockets-at-miami-heat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/battle-in-south-beach-houston-rockets-at-miami-heat-14474\/","title":{"rendered":"Battle In South Beach: Houston Rockets At Miami Heat"},"content":{"rendered":"

Houston Rockets AT Miami Heat<\/strong>
\nMar 27, 2011 at 6 PM EST<\/strong>
\nOpening Line:\u00a0 Mia -8.5<\/strong>
\nCurrent Line:\u00a0 Mia -8<\/strong>
\nOpening Total:\u00a0 208<\/strong>
\nCurrent Total: 209.5<\/strong>
\nOpening Moneyline:\u00a0 Mia -425 \/ Hou +355<\/strong>
\nCurrent Moneyline:\u00a0 Mia -400 \/ Hou +330<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
Miami Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra knows the importance of this game for both teams<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For as well as the Rockets have played since the All Star break, going 12-3, they still find themselves on the outside looking in for the Western Conference playoffs.\u00a0 They realize winning is about all they can do; they can’t base their chances on the performance of other teams.\u00a0 \u201cYou can only win your games because that\u2019s the only way we\u2019re going to get there,\u201d coach Rick Adelman told the Rockets\u2019 official website. \u201cWe started this thing by going on the road and winning, and that\u2019s what we\u2019re going to have to continue to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chuck Hayes looks at the road trip the only way a playoff contending team can.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019d be great to win all three,\u201d said Hayes. \u201cWe\u2019re playing to win all three.\u201d\u00a0 If Houston CAN win all three, it will take them to an 8 game win streak.\u00a0 Their current streak of 5 is tied with Orlando for the second longest win streak in the league (LAL is at 6).<\/p>\n

Some betting trends:<\/p>\n

Houston is 5-0 SU In their last 5 games and they are 7-2 SU in their last 9 on the road.\u00a0 The total has gone OVER in 6 of their last 8 games agaisnt the Heat and they are 4-11 SU in their last 15 road games against the Heat.\u00a0 Houston is 5-9-1 ATS in their last 15 road games against Miami and the total has gone OVER in 6 of the last 9 road games against the Miami Heat.<\/p>\n

Miami is 5-10 ATS in their last 15 games and the total has gone UNDER in 4 of their last 6 games.\u00a0 Miami is 7-1 SU in their last 8 games and the total has gone UNDER in 7 of their last 10 at home.\u00a0 Miami is 5-1 SU in their last 6 games at home and the total has gone OVER in 6 of their last 8 games against Houston.\u00a0 The total has gone OVER in 6 of their last 9 at home against the Rockets and they are 11-4 SU in their last 15 home games against the Houston Rockets.<\/p>\n

Key Matchups:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Kevin Martin vs. Dwyane Wade<\/strong><\/p>\n

Kevin Martin continues to have one of the best seasons of his 9 year NBA career, averaging over 23 points per game for the first time since 08-09 when he put up 24.6 points per game.\u00a0 He’s shooting 43.7% from the floor and 39.3% from three.\u00a0 He also gets to the line a lot, attempting 8.4 free throws per game and hitting 86.3% of those attempts.\u00a0 Wade’s numbers have surprisingly been pretty steady despite the addition of two other superstars.\u00a0 His scoring average is down only 1 point from last season, and his minutes are actually slightly up.\u00a0 The only real hit statistically to Wade has been his assists.\u00a0 He’s averaging a career low 4.4 assists per game mainly due to the fact that LeBron James is the primary ball handler and Wade has been playing off the ball.\u00a0 Wade will definitely get the better of Martin in this matchup, but Martin is capable of scoring in heaps.<\/p>\n

Luis Scola vs. Chris Bosh<\/strong><\/p>\n

Despite the fact that he has levelled off from his red hot start this season, Scola is still putting up a career best 18.3 points per game and as heavily as he is relied upon by Houston he will challenge Bosh tonight as to which player can score more points.\u00a0 Bosh’s 18.5 points per game is pretty much identical and he’s scored 20 or more in 4 of his last 6 games, including a 30 point game against the Spurs, a game which the Heat won by 30.\u00a0 Scola just returned from injury to post a 20-10 game in only 31 minutes of play.<\/p>\n

Tonight’s game is pretty heavily in the Heat’s favor, but I’m not sure it should be.\u00a0 Houston has been playing really well and they know the urgency involved in tonight’s game.\u00a0 Winning could pull Houston within half a game of the playoffs, while losing would be a significant setback with so few games left in the season.\u00a0 Expect the Rockets starters to come out firing and attempt to quiet the Heat crowd early in the game.\u00a0 If they can get off to a good start, they could be able to thwart the Heat’s inevitable rallies later in the game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Houston Rockets AT Miami Heat Mar 27, 2011 at 6 PM EST Opening Line:\u00a0 Mia -8.5 Current Line:\u00a0 Mia -8 Opening Total:\u00a0 208 Current Total: 209.5 Opening Moneyline:\u00a0 Mia -425 \/ Hou +355 Current Moneyline:\u00a0 Mia -400 \/ Hou +330 For as well as the Rockets have played since the All Star break, going 12-3, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40250,"featured_media":9349,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444,133],"tags":[831,707],"class_list":["post-14474","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-nba-handicapping","tag-houston-rockets","tag-miami-heat"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40250"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14474"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14474\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14475,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14474\/revisions\/14475"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9349"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}