{"id":23397,"date":"2012-06-19T12:03:49","date_gmt":"2012-06-19T17:03:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=23397"},"modified":"2012-06-19T12:03:49","modified_gmt":"2012-06-19T17:03:49","slug":"thunder-vs-heat-game-4-2012-nba-finals-betting-preview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/thunder-vs-heat-game-4-2012-nba-finals-betting-preview-23397\/","title":{"rendered":"Thunder vs. Heat: Game 4, 2012 NBA Finals Betting Preview"},"content":{"rendered":"

Oklahoma City Thunder at Miami Heat
\nTuesday, 6\/19\/12, 9:00 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 ABC
\nOpening Point Spread:\u00a0 Miami -3.5
\nCurrent Betting Line:\u00a0 Miami -3.5
\nOpening Total:\u00a0 191.5
\nCurrent Total:\u00a0 192.5
\nOdds Courtesy of Bookmaker<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Oklahoma City Thunder PG Russell Westbrook needs to shoot less in Game 4 in Miami<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Oklahoma City has lost back-to-back games against the Miami Heat in the 2012 NBA Finals, but the youthful roster isn\u2019t going to panic because of it heading into Game 4.\u00a0 The last time the Thunder dropped consecutive games in the 2012 NBA playoffs, they went on to win four straight in the Western Conference final to eliminate the San Antonio Spurs in six games.\u00a0 \u201cWe were down 2-0 against San Antonio and everybody thought the series was over,\u201d stated Thunder head coach Scott Brooks about the situation at hand.\u00a0 Oklahoma City is 2-2 as a road underdog of 3.5 to 6 points this season, with the \u201cunder\u201d going 3-1 in those contests.<\/p>\n

The Thunder are being led offensively by their explosive duo of Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, but many around the league are beginning to think that the team\u2019s point guard is shooting too much.\u00a0 Westbrook had more shots than Durant in the first two games, which needs to change on Tuesday night inside the American Airlines Arena.\u00a0 Oklahoma City also needs to get back to shooting a high percentage at the free throw line, hitting just 15 of 24 attempts in Sunday\u2019s 91-85 setback as four-point road underdogs in Game 3.<\/p>\n

Miami has to be focused on trying to close out this series in five games, as it wrestled away home-court advantage with a Game 2 win in Oklahoma City.\u00a0 The Heat own a 2-1 series lead in the best-of-seven series, and LeBron James has led the way offensively, averaging 30.7 points and 9.7 rebounds over the entire postseason.\u00a0 The 2012 NBA MVP is shooting 46 percent in this particular series, but pales in comparison to Durant\u2019s 57 percent clip at this stage of the game.\u00a0 Miami is 3-1 ATS as a home favorite of 3.5 to 6 points this season.<\/p>\n

The Heat continue to be puzzled by Dwyane Wade\u2019s slow starts during the postseason, as he\u2019s shooting less from 40 percent from the field in the opening 24 minutes of games.\u00a0 Miami is 9-2 at home during the playoffs, and it wouldn\u2019t be the end of the world if it happened to fall short in this affair.\u00a0 The team hasn\u2019t lost back-to-back home games this season, posting a 7-0 record in its next game in front of its fans following a defeat, winning those games by an average of 20.3 points.<\/p>\n

Bettors will likely back the Heat due to their 12-4 ATS mark at home, while the Thunder are 1-5-1 ATS as an underdog of 4.5 or fewer points.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t miss out on a winning season and let the NBA handicappers at Maddux Sports line your pockets with cash.\u00a0 Long term packages are available now!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Oklahoma City Thunder at Miami Heat Tuesday, 6\/19\/12, 9:00 PM EST, TV:\u00a0 ABC Opening Point Spread:\u00a0 Miami -3.5 Current Betting Line:\u00a0 Miami -3.5 Opening Total:\u00a0 191.5 Current Total:\u00a0 192.5 Odds Courtesy of Bookmaker Oklahoma City has lost back-to-back games against the Miami Heat in the 2012 NBA Finals, but the youthful roster isn\u2019t going to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":15517,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444,133],"tags":[6774,1193,66,707,399],"class_list":["post-23397","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","category-nba-handicapping","tag-2012-nba-finals","tag-kevin-durant","tag-lebron-james","tag-miami-heat","tag-oklahoma-city-thunder"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23397","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\/181"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23397"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23397\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23398,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23397\/revisions\/23398"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15517"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23397"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23397"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23397"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}