The San Antonio Spurs opened with a -130 moneyline to win the NBA Finals according to America’s Bookie. This is the first time that the Heat are an underdog in the NBA Finals since LeBron James joined the team.
These two teams gave us an exciting NBA Finals last year and many expect them to do the same this time around.
The defending champion Heat reached the NBA Finals after beating the Pacers 117-92 last Friday and the Spurs joined them with last night’s 112-107 overtime road win against the Thunder. The Spurs prevailed despite the fact that Tony Parker sat out the entire second half with ankle soreness.
The Heat won last year’s Finals 4-3 thanks to a 95-88 Game 7 victory. Miami had home court advantage, which proved to be the difference but this year the Spurs secured that benefit throughout the playoffs because of their NBA best 62-20 regular season record.
Home court advantage has served San Antonio well, as they improved to 9-1 at AT&T Center in these playoffs after destroying the Thunder 117-89 in Game 5 of the Western Conference Finals last Thursday. The Spurs have won their last seven home games by 20.3 points per contest, which is one of the reasons why the bookmakers favor them to beat the Heat in the NBA Finals.
The Heat fell to 4-3 on the road in the playoffs after suffering two losses in the Eastern Conference Finals against the Pacers, 96-107 and 90-93 at the Bankers Life Fieldhouse.
Head to head, Miami has won five of their last nine meetings with San Antonio (including last year’s NBA Finals). The teams split this year’s season series, with the Heat winning 113-101 in Miami and the Spurs winning 111-87 in San Antonio.
Game 1 of the 2014 NBA Finals will take place next Thursday at 9:00 PM ET and ABC will provide coverage of the series.
Below are the complete odds to win the 2014 NBA Finals at America’s Bookie:
Heat Even
Spurs -130
