We’re in the endgame now
The next 7 days could very well decide the playoff fate of the Dallas Mavericks. Dallas is now in control of their own destiny when it comes to avoiding the play-in tournament and it’s time to start looking at potential first-round matchups. It’s not just the lower seeds that are in flux. The Golden State Warriors now find themselves in a battle for 10 with a red-hot Rockets team that simply refuses to go away. At the top of the West, the Oklahoma City Thunder and Minnesota Timberwolves are a half-game behind the defending champion Nuggets for the top seed. The last two and a half weeks of the NBA season should be highly entertaining.
Below, let’s rank possible scenarios from best to worst before we get into the upcoming fixtures for each team.
- Mavericks finish 6th and play either the Timberwolves or the Thunder in the first round.
- Dallas finishes 5th and play the Los Angeles Clippers who are essentially locked into the 4th seed.
- The Mavericks finish 6th and play the Denver Nuggets.
- Dallas slides back into the play-in and have to fight for their playoff lives against some combination of Steph Curry, Lebron James/AD, and KD/Booker.
5th Seed New Orleans Pelicans
- Milwaukee Bucks
- Boston Celtics
- Phoenix Suns
- Orlando Magic
For the first time, we are including 5th-seeded Pelicans in this Standings Watch. They have a one-game lead over the Mavericks and have an absolutely brutal schedule in the next week. A slimmed-down Zion has been obliterating teams in crunch time as the point forward. The Pelicans are versatile and can beat you in several ways. There’s a part of me that still doesn’t buy into their ability to get stops when it counts but their offense is undeniable. You could tell me they win their next four games or tell me they finish 0-4. If the Pelicans are who some think they are, they’ll have to win 2, if not 3, out of their next four to avoid falling to 6th. I’m guessing they’ll go 2-2 with all 4 games being at home.
6th Seed Dallas Mavericks
- @ Sacramento Kings
- @Houston Rockets
- @Golden State Warriors
- Atlanta Hawks
The upcoming game against the Kings is without question the most important game of the season thus far. A loss would give the Kings a 3-1 advantage in the head to head tiebreaker. Get through that game and the team heads to Houston to take on Jalen Green and the streaking Rockets. Anything could happen in that game. After that is a yet another road game against the Warriors. The Warriors are clearly a shell of their former selves but they play to whatever their current ceiling is at home and it would be unwise to look past them. Thankfully, the Mavs have a gimme against the Hawks. A 2-2 record is probably good enough to keep pace but 3-1, with one of the three wins coming against the Kings, would go a long way towards avoiding the play-in.
7th Seed Phoenix Suns
- @OKC Thunder
- @New Orleans Pelicans
- Cleveland Cavaliers
I have no idea what to say about the Suns. They can outscore anyone on any given night and give up a 15-point lead in the blink of an eye on another. What I can say is that I want no part of this team in a win-or-go-home scenario in the play-in. With Donovan Mitchell on the verge of returning, they have three difficult games in the coming week.
8th Seed Sacramento Kings
You can pencil in a win against the Jazz. The Knicks, despite being 8-2 in their last 10 games, just aren’t the same team without Julius Randle. Most of those 8 wins came against the league’s bottom feeders. That game is probably a toss-up. I’ll give the Knicks a slight edge since they beat the Kings the last time the two teams faced off. I think the Kings go 1-3, including a loss to the Mavs, and fall off the pace.