Miami Heat vs Oklahoma City Thunder 3/18/22 NBA Picks, Predictions, Odds

The Oklahoma City Thunder invade the FTX Arena to do battle with the Miami Heat on Friday night.

The Oklahoma City Thunder have been in terrible shape as they’ve lost 10 of their last 12 games overall and they will be hoping to put an end to a seven-game slide after coming up painfully short to the Spurs in a 122-120 road loss on Wednesday. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander led the team with 34 points, six rebounds and eight assists, Darius Bazley added 25 points with nine rebounds while Aleksej Pokusevski chipped in with 16 points off the bench. As a team, the Thunder shot 52 percent from the field and 13 of 35 from the 3-point line as they rallied back from an early 16-point deficit to take the lead late in the fourth quarter, only to see the Spurs’ Lonnie Walker snatch the game away from them with the game-winning layup with just 1.8 seconds remaining.  

Meanwhile, the Miami Heat have been in great form as they’ve won nine of their last 12 games overall and they will be looking to stay hot after taking down the Pistons in a 105-98 home win on Tuesday. Tyler Herro led the team with 29 points, five rebounds and four assists off the bench, Max Strus and Bam Adebayo each scored 16 points while Duncan Robinson chipped in with 12 points. As a team, the Heat shot just 40 percent from the field and 12 of 33 from the 3-point line as they looked to be in trouble after scoring just 11 points in the third quarter, before they made up for it with 37 points in the fourth quarter to escape with the win. Jimmy Butler had a rough night as he scored just eight points on two of nine shooting while Kyle Lowry scored just six points on zero of three shooting.

Looking at the betting trends, the Thunder are 23-8 ATS in their last 31 road games and 23-8 ATS in their last 31 games as a road underdog. The Heat are 6-1 ATS in their last seven games against a team below .400, 10-4-1 ATS in their last 15 games against a team with a losing record and 6-2 ATS in their last eight games overall.  

Head to head, the under is 12-4 in the last 16 meetings overall, the Thunder are 1-5 ATS in the last six meetings overall and the Thunder are 5-2 ATS in the last seven meetings in Miami.

The Thunder are still missing a long list of players and they could be without Shai Gilgeous-Alexander who is listed as questionable for this one, while the Heat are sweating on the availability of Jimmy Butler, PJ Tucker and Caleb Martin who are all questionable. I can’t imagine anything but an easy win for the Heat if Gilgeous-Alexander isn’t able to suit up, but if he plays, I think the Thunder can hang around long enough to get the cover in this spot.