Defending champions Los Angeles Lakers have had a quite difficult season so far and are deservingly placed 7th in the Western Conference standings as we head into the last week of the NBA regular season.
They have lost eight of their last eleven games including a narrow defeat to Portland Trail Blazers, who are yet direct
ly above them in 6th place, last Saturday.
Placed 8th on the Western Conference standings are Golden State Warriors, who have enjoyed some sort of brilliant resurgence this month to secure a firm grip of their position. Steph Curry particularly seems to have caught brilliant form as he delivered terrific performances in the Dubs’ comfortable back-to-back wins over Oklahoma City Thunder.
Now with just four rounds of games left until the end of the regular season, there is an interesting prospect of having these two massively successful franchises face off in the play-in tournament.
In case you are unaware, this play-in tournament will tip off at the end of this regular season to determine which teams will emerge the 7th and 8th seed in the playoffs. In clearer terms, it’s a competition that concerns the teams currently placed between 7th and 10th place in each conference league.
First, the 7th seed will take on the 8th seed with the winner clinching qualification to the playoffs as the 7th seed. Meanwhile, the loser of this tie will have to face the winner of the other tie between the 9th and 10th seed for a chance to be awarded the 8th seed of the playoffs.
When the regular season ends in a week’s time and the position of Lakers and Warriors do not change, we could be seeing two of the very best players the NBA has had in recent times – LeBron James and Steph Curry – square off and try to get their respective teams just over the line into the playoffs.
James, who is currently out with an ankle injury, has had a quite challenging season. He returned to action at the start of the month after missing 20 consecutive games due to ankle injury, but he unfortunately had to return to the treatment room after only his second game since return owing to same ankle problem. So far this season, he’s played 43 games, averaging 25 points per game – an unimpressive number going by his own standards.
However, he is expected to be back again for Lakers ahead postseason activities and could prove vital for them in their quest to keep their title defence dreams alive. Nonetheless, James has categorically expressed disgust at the prospect of competing in the play-in tournament as he labelled the concept a ‘wack’ one.
“Whoever came up with that shit needs to be fired,” LeBron said of the play-in tournament last week, after Lakers’ loss to Toronto Raptors.
Notably, Lakers are on 38-30 just one win short of Portland Trail Blazers (39-29) who are 6th so LeBron’s team can still dream of escaping the play-in by gatecrashing the top-six. Warriors, in contrast, would not fancy their own chances as they have a significantly inferior 35-33 with only four games left.
All the same, there’s a good possibility of a Lakers vs. Warriors matchup in the play-in and that would add an interesting wrinkle at the start of the postseason, one you sure would not have predicted at the start of the season.
Talking of your prediction skills, you should not sleep on the massive odds made available by NetBet Nigeria as you bet on basketball games, especially in the NBA. The remaining games in the regular season as well as the postseason games could provide interesting options you can take advantage of.
