Oklahoma City Thunder vs. Miami Heat. Kevin Durant vs. LeBron James. Eastern Conference vs. Western Conference. The storylines are set for Wednesday night\u2019s matchup between the two contenders in opposite conferences, and with the top two MVP candidates set to face off, this is must-see television for any NBA fan. [ad-4468020]<\/p>\n
Oklahoma City (36-10) at Miami (32-12)<\/strong> ATS Matchup Insight<\/a> | CP Insider Gambling Preview<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n The Oklahoma City Thunder weren\u2019t supposed to be this good without Russell Westbrook. The team struggled in the 2013 postseason without its floor general and second-leading scorer, and at the time, it looked as if Kevin Durant, for as good as he is, couldn\u2019t be a No. 1 option without a reliable No. 2.<\/p>\n As it turns out, Durant has put all those thoughts to rest, as the Westsbrook-less Thunder are competing for a top spot out West, while Durant continues to be on an absolute tear.<\/p>\n At this point in the season, Durant has to be considered the favorite for the league\u2019s Most Valuable Player award.<\/p>\n LeBron James has won the honor four of the last five years, including the last two, but at this pace, it\u2019s Durant\u2019s trophy to lose. The 25-year-old has scored 30 or more points in his last 11 games.<\/p>\n Defensively, the Thunder will have an obvious focus on James.<\/p>\n This is a matchup between two teams that are both top 10 in scoring, as well as points allowed, but the truth is that James and Durant should put on quite a showcase. If the Thunder can slow down the role players for Miami, they\u2019ll be in good shape toward the end of the game. The Miami Heat cannot hope to stop Kevin Durant; they can only hope to contain him.<\/p>\n There\u2019s two mentalities coming into this contest when it comes to slowing down the league\u2019s hottest player. First, Miami could double (or triple) team the small forward in hopes of slowing him down.<\/p>\n The other option is to put him one-on-one while stopping the rest of the Thunder offense.<\/p>\n If the Heat are smart, they\u2019ll concede to the notion that they can stop Durant, admit that no one on the plant can slow him down and focus their attention on the rest of the OKC offense.<\/p>\n Miami has been knocked in the past for not caring about the regular season, but this contest will test that mentality. This may just be one game in an 82-game season, but it\u2019s going to have an NBA Finals atmosphere, as it could very well be a preview\u00a0of what\u2019s to come in June.<\/p>\n Expect this game to be close all the way, but don\u2019t be shocked if the Heat use home-court advantage and pull away late. Kevin Durant should win the individual battle, but it will be Miami coming out on top of the war.<\/p>\n Prediction: Miami 103\u00a0\u2013 Oklahoma\u00a0City 99<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" OKC vs Miami NBA Betting Odds Oklahoma City Thunder vs. Miami Heat. Kevin Durant vs. LeBron James. Eastern Conference vs. Western Conference. The storylines are set for Wednesday night\u2019s matchup between the two contenders in opposite conferences, and with the top two MVP candidates set to face off, this is must-see television for any NBA […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":68,"featured_media":62641,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[4169,1451,2765,10568,8471,54449,55291,4398,46924],"class_list":["post-72107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nba","tag-heat","tag-miami","tag-miami-heat","tag-oklahoma-city","tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","tag-oklahoma-city-thunder-vs-miami-heat","tag-oklahoma-city-vs-miami","tag-thunder","tag-thunder-vs-heat"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72107","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/68"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72107"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72107\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72109,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72107\/revisions\/72109"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72107"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72107"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72107"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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