Three keys for Miami Heat in the NBA Finals

The eight-seeded Miami Heat go into the NBA Finals as decided underdogs. Denver is a four-to-one favorite to win the series. The Nuggets cruised to the top seed in the West, while Miami had to fight their way through the play-in tournament.

Still, the Heat have been underdogs all playoffs. Here are three keys to Miami pulling off another upset and winning it all.

1. Make Nikola Jokic a scorer

Denver's Jokic is averaging a triple-double in the playoffs, with 29.9 points, 13.3 rebounds and 10.3 assists. Miami might not be able to stop Jokic in the first two categories - even their four-time All-Defensive team center Bam Adebayo allowed the Joker shoot 66.7 percent as his primary defender. But the last statistic is something the Heat hope they can control.

On the Hoop Collective podcast, Kings coach Mike Brown revealed that last year, the Warriors refused to send double teams against Jokic in their first-round series. "If he got 50, he had 50," Brown said. "What we felt his team feeds off of is if he gets 26 and and 10 (assists), or 32 and 12. If he scores and we can limit everybody else, then you may have a chance."

While that was a different Nuggets team last year - Jamal Murray and Michael Porter Jr. were out - the theory remains sound. Guarding Jokic straight up could help deny what truly makes him special - his passing. Plus, carrying the scoring load is tiring, as we saw when Jokic put up 19 points and 16 rebounds in the first half of Game 1 against the Lakers, but looked tired late, getting his only fourth-quarter points on free throws.

2. Playoff Jimmy needs to return

Jimmy Butler is simply a different player in the playoffs. Of Butler's seven highest-scoring games of his career, five of them happened in the playoffs. He scored 98 points over the final two games of the Heat's win over the Bucks, including a truly impossible shot to send the game to OT.