NBA Betting – Oklahoma City Thunder at Chicago Bulls

Oklahoma City Thunder (-3, 200.5 o/u) at Chicago 

The shorthanded Chicago Bulls (38-23, 19-13 home) will try to keep pace with Cleveland in the Central Division tonight when they welcome the also-injured Oklahoma City Thunder (34-27, 14-19 away) to the United Center (8:00 p.m. Eastern).

On Tuesday, the Bulls – who were playing without Derrick Rose and Jimmy Butler – got past the Wizards, 97-92, on the strength of 23 points and eight boards from rookie Nikola Mirotic.

Chicago will need the rookie to continue his strong play as Rose is out four to six weeks with a knee injury, while Butler is sidelined three to four weeks with a sprained elbow. As if that wasn’t enough, power forward Taj Gibson (ankle) is in a walking boot and is listed as day-to-day.

The Bulls injury problems have seen them get leap-frogged by the Cavaliers in the Central Division standings; they are currently one game back and fourth overall in the Eastern Conference.

Oklahoma City, meanwhile, is without reigning NBA MVP Kevin Durant (foot). However, point guard Russell Westbrook is playing MVP caliber basketball of his own with KD out of the lineup. Last night, Westbrook dropped 49 points on the Sixers en route to a 123-118 win. He also posted his fourth straight triple-double in the game.

Westbrook’s strong play has put the Thunder in a playoff position for the time being; OKC is currently eighth in the West, one game up on New Orleans and 3.5 back of seventh-place San Antonio.

The Thunder are currently three-point favorites for tonight’s game. Looking at the trends, the Thunder have beaten the Bulls in their last five regular season tilts (but this will be the first meeting of the 2014-15 season). OKC is also 4-1 ATS in its last five at the United Center.

(Photo credit:  Keith Allison (flickr) “Joakim Noah” [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/legalcode]. Photo has been cropped.)