Miami Heat vs Oklahoma City Thunder Prediction & Picks | NBA Betting Preview (Friday, March 8)

Here's everything you need to know about Heat vs Thunder on Friday, March 8 — our expert prediction and betting picks for today.

The Miami Heat will travel from Dallas to Oklahoma City to take on the Oklahoma City Thunder on a Friday night back-to-back. Can the Heat bounce back from their tight loss to the Dallas Mavericks, or will the rested Thunder dominate at home?

The latest Heat vs Thunder odds have the Thunder listed as an 8.5-point favorite on the spread with an over/under of 224.5 total points (via DraftKings).

Let's get to our Heat vs Thunder prediction and pick.

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The Miami Heat are on a back to back here, but that notwithstanding Miami still matches up well with the Thunder defensively.

One of the Thunder’s biggest offensive edges is their ability to play with five shooters on the floor. That enables Oklahoma City to achieve elite spacing for players like Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams to get to good spots inside the arc or at the rim.

The Heat are well-equipped to deal with the Thunder’s spacing and versatility, because Miami has Bam Adebayo. Bam is extremely mobile and more than capable of switching every screen and closing out to shooters.

The Heat did an excellent job of this in the first matchup between these two teams. In that game, Oklahoma City attempted two total shots at the rim and just 36% of its shots from the 3-point line. The Thunder attempted a massive 59% of their shots from the midrange, but they hit 69% of these midrange looks. Overall, the Thunder had an effective field goal percentage of 67.4% (96th percentile) and still won the game by just 6 points.

I’d argue that the Heat’s defensive process was sound in that game, but the Thunder’s elite shot-making was too much to overcome.

It bears emphasizing that this is a much different Miami Heat team than the one that faced the Thunder on Jan. 10. That team was missing Jimmy Butler, and they also did not have Terry Rozier nor Caleb Martin in that game.

With Jimmy Butler on the floor, the Heat have a +3.8 net-rating versus a -3.3 net when he is off (+6.5 swing). When Butler, Rozier and Martin have shared the floor together, the Heat have an elite +8.5 net-rating predicated on their elite defensive rating of 111.2 in these scenarios.

Erik Spoelstra is discovering effective lineups, and this is a truly elite defense when Martin shares the floor with Adebayo and Butler. We’ve also seen the reemergence of Duncan Robinson as an elite role player during the last several weeks: He is shooting 42% from 3 on career-high usage and averaging a career high in assists.

This Heat team is trending up, and their loss to the Mavericks last night doesn’t change their trajectory in my estimation: I thought Miami looked solid in that game.

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Heat +8.5 is the play here.

The Thunder are not 4 points better than the Mavericks team (-4.5) that defeated the Heat last night — even when you factor in the back to back.

The Heat matchup well, can slow the game down and can force the Thunder to play in the halfcourt. Miami is also 14th in offensive turnover rate, which is important against this Thunder defense that ranks No. 1 in the NBA in turnover rate.

If Miami can take care of the ball and turn this into a halfcourt game, then I like their chances to cover the +8.5.

Pick: Heat +8.5 (-108; DraftKings)