| The bad news, for the teams in the mesmerizing logjam engulfing the NBA’s Eastern Conference, is that a regular-season record of fewer than 56 wins hardly ever results in a championship. The good news, for everyone watching things play out over the final week of a campaign boasting more balance than an Olympic gymnast, is the parity that’s defined the East all year has led to a white-knuckle ride to close things out. Heading into Tuesday’s matchups, the gap between the Miami Heat — currently in line for the conference’s top seed — and the 10th-placed Brooklyn Nets on the outer edge of the play-in tournament, was just 10.5 games. By way of comparison, the separation between the Western Conference-topping Phoenix Suns and the San Antonio Spurs — fighting to remain No. 10 on the left-hand side of the country — was a whopping 29 games. In the East, the season started out with evenness and never shifted from that trend. All of which means a fight for the top seeds between the Heat, Boston Celtics, Milwaukee Bucks and Philadelphia 76ers. And a scrap for position at the lower end, too, where the Cleveland Cavaliers, Atlanta Hawks, Charlotte Hornets and the Nets are jostling to secure themselves the most favorable draw in the play-in. “This is what you always want,” Heat head coach Erik Spoelstra told reporters. “You want to have the games have meaning and context and significance to them. And that’s basically every game right now in the Eastern Conference.” Between now and Sunday’s culmination of the regular season, there are no fewer than 10 games scheduled where both teams are in the top 10 in the East. How it plays out, what kind of lineups coaches use and how they allocate their stars’ minutes, will tell us much about the perceived value of postseason home-court advantage in the current NBA. At different times, it seemed like the race could blow wide open. The Chicago Bulls were in spectacular form earlier in the season, good enough to temporarily thrust DeMar DeRozan near the front of the MVP race. No longer. The Bulls went 7-12 after the All-Star break and, having led the conference to begin 2022, are now in danger of dropping to sixth behind the Toronto Raptors, or even seventh behind Cleveland. Conversely, and this says all you need to know about the East, a sudden form reversal over the remaining four games could still bump them into the top three. At the summit, the Heat appear to have overcome a late-season blip that featured a spicy sideline argument between Spoelstra and Jimmy Butler. The 76ers have acquired James Harden and ridden the brilliance of Joel Embiid, who admitted he’ll “feel like (the voters) hate me” if he doesn’t win MVP this year. The Celtics’ hot streak lost some sparkle when influential center Robert Williams III suffered a significant knee injury, while the defending champion Milwaukee Bucks loom dangerously once again, with Giannis Antetokounmpo as dominant as ever. Over the final few games, the leading teams may also be forgiven for casting an eye toward the bottom of the playoff picture. Brooklyn is just 40-38 but rated at +500 with FOXBet to win the whole championship, a level of favoritism surpassed only by the rampant Suns. A combination of a healthy Kevin Durant, a freshly-available Kyrie Irving, and potentially, the defensive prowess of Ben Simmons, has positioned Brooklyn as a team few would relish facing. “We don’t have any time to waste,” Irving said. “It is not ideal, the season we’ve had. Down the stretch, we have got to figure it out.” Like we mentioned at the top, history is not kind to those securing lowly regular-season win totals when it comes to the serious business of trying to lift the Larry O’Brien Trophy. The Heat did it behind 52 wins in 2005-06, which is the lowest this century for a complete 82-game schedule. The Detroit Pistons got there with 54 in 2004, besting Kobe and Shaq’s Lakers in the Finals. The highest number of wins possible this time is 54, and only then if Miami wins its last three. So yeah, it’s a parity party in the East, with no standout team, no dominant force — and no margin for error heading into the playoffs. |
