The Miami Heat will be hoping to square up the series against the Denver Nuggets in Game 2 of the NBA Finals at the Ball Arena on Sunday night.

The Miami Heat came into the NBA Finals with plenty of confidence after outlasting the Celtics in a thrilling seven-game series, but they are now looking to bounce back in this one after getting thrashed by the Nuggets in Game 1 on Thursday. Bam Adebayo led the way with 26 points, 13 rebounds and five assists on 13 of 25 shooting, Gabe Vincent added 19 points with five assists while Haywood Highsmith chipped in with 18 points off the bench. As a team, the Heat shot just 40 percent from the field and 13 of 39 from the 3-point line as they struggled to find their offense from the start and were never truly in the contest after getting outscored by 59-42 in the first half. Jimmy Butler had quiet game of just 13 points with seven rebounds and seven assists, while Caleb Martin and Duncan Robinson scored just three points apiece.

Meanwhile, the Denver Nuggets are now aiming to take a 2-0 series lead after having it almost all their way in a dominant win on Thursday. Nikola Jokic led the team with a triple-double of 27 points with 10 rebounds and 14 assists, Jamal Murray added 26 points with 10 assists, Aaron Gordon tallied 16 points while Michael Porter Jr. chipped in with 14 points. As a team, the Nuggets shot 50 percent from the field and eight of 27 from the 3-point line as they dominated most of the contest to lead by as many as 24 points, before they held off a late charge from the Heat to cap off a solid victory.  

Looking at the betting trends, the Heat are 6-2 ATS in their last eight road games, 4-13 ATS in their last 17 games playing on two days rest and 12-5 ATS in their last 17 games overall. The Nuggets are 8-3 ATS in their last 11 home games, 9-4 ATS in their last 13 games following a win and 5-2 ATS in their last seven games overall.

Head to head, the over is 5-1 in the last six meetings overall, the Heat are 0-4 ATS in the last four meetings in Denver and the Heat are 9-26 ATS in the last 35 meetings overall.

The Heat will be so disappointed that they weren’t able to steal home-court advantage as they had won Game 1 of each series until Thursday where they just came out flat. The Heat didn’t get good production out of anyone except for Adebayo, but they will take confidence in the fact that they were still in the contest despite finishing the game with just two free throw attempts for the game. The Nuggets will be delighted with how things turned out on Thursday, but they know the Heat will bounce back and come out with a much better performance.  The Nuggets are still undefeated at home in the playoffs this season and I think that trend continues here, but the Heat played one of their worst games and still almost covered the spread, so I’m backing them to make things more interesting this time out.