With NBA coming back, a few things to know
The deals are done. The NBA is coming back. The season will resume on July 30 at Disney’s ESPN Wide World of Sports complex in Florida.
Here are some things to know about the restarted season:
THE RACE FOR 8
There are six teams in the race for the No. 8 seed in the Western Conference — Memphis, Portland, New Orleans, Sacramento, San Antonio and Phoenix. (Technically, Dallas is also in that race, though the Mavericks need only one win and one Memphis loss to clinch no worse than the No. 7 spot.)
There are seven games where those six teams will go head-to-head, including four featuring the Pelicans — who play Sacramento twice, Memphis once and San Antonio once. The other games: Sacramento vs. San Antonio, Memphis vs. San Antonio and Portland vs. Memphis.
Phoenix doesn’t play any of the other five teams in the race for eighth.
The Grizzlies start with a 31⁄2-game lead over Portland, New Orleans and Sacramento, along with a four-game edge on San Antonio. Unless the Grizzlies open up space on all four of those clubs, it seems likely that there will be a best-of-two play-in series for the final spot in the West playoffs and a probable first-round matchup with LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers.
The play-in games will take place if the ninth-place team in either conference is within four games of eighth when the seeding round ends.
In the East, it’s a bit simpler. No. 7 Brooklyn is six games ahead of Washington and No. 8 Orlando is 5-1⁄2 games clear of the Wizards in the race to clinch a berth and avoid a play-in series. None of those teams can move past the No. 7 spot on the East bracket.
MAGIC NUMBERS
Milwaukee needs a combination of two wins or Toronto losses to clinch the No. 1 seed in the East. The Lakers need a combination of three wins or Los Angeles Clippers losses to clinch the
No. 1 spot out West.
Denver also has a mathematical chance at the No. 1 seed out West — but would need to go 8-0 and have the Lakers go 0-8 for that to happen.
Most of the races at Disney will be for seeding. Milwaukee cannot finish lower than No. 2 in the East and Toronto needs only one win to be assured of a top-four seed. The West can still see some shakeups, with four games separating second place from sixth place and only 21⁄2 games separating fourth place from seventh.
HEAT CHECK
Miami had a league-high eight games remaining against the eight teams that didn’t qualify for the Disney restart.
Now the Heat will have a fight on their hands just to hang onto the No. 4 spot in the East.
Miami plays Boston, Denver, Indiana twice, Milwaukee, Oklahoma City, Toronto and Phoenix in the seeding games. That schedule ranks harder than Indiana’s or Philadelphia’s — the Pacers and 76ers both will head to Disney two games behind the Heat in the East standings.
Orlando and the Lakers both saw seven games against the eight Disneynon-qualifiers cancelled, tied for secondmost in the league behind Miami. Memphis had the fewest such games lost, with just one — a matchup against New York.
HOME ON THE ROAD
All 22 teams will be staying at the Disney campus for the rest of their seasons. Yes, that includes the Orlando Magic — whose home arena is about 50 kilometres from Disney World.
NO 3’S RECORD
For the first time in eight seasons, the league record for total 3-pointers made won’t get broken. It was on pace to be smashed. NBA teams have combined for 23,560 3-pointers made so far this season, which is already the fourth-most of any season in league history. The league was on pace for 29,844 3-pointers, which is 1,889 more than the record of 27,955 set last season.