Still four or five regular season games remaining for teams but might as well make this a play-off thread - surprised one wasn’t already started.
Nice of the Raptors to pick this part of the season to play their most absolutely mojo-less b-ball. Their porous defense is giving me serious doubts of them getting past even the first round, even with their pretty good bench.
As of today, the East is basically set in terms of who’s in and who’s out. Milwaukee is 4.5 games ahead of Detroit for the 8th seed. The West is still open. Denver is on the outside looking in but they’re only a half game out and only 2 games behind the number 4 seed Utah Jazz. So we could see a bit of shuffling there.
Nuggets always find themselves in this position. Never a championship caliber team but not angling for a top draft pick either. It’s NBA limbo.
you can say that again
Big exhale after that Raptor win over the Celtics. Prior to tonight’s game,
El grosso:
Raptors, last 8 games (before tonight):
OPP PTS - 113.9 (29th in league)
OPP FG% - 49.1% (30th)
OPP 3-PT% - 44.8% (30th)
DEF RTG - 113.5% (30th)
PT DIFF - -2.9 (21st)
And they’ve been healthy! Ibaka has been a disappointment. At least the Raptors played much better defense tonight (or technically last night being after midnight). Despite going 3 for 22 on threes and turnovers galore, Stevens and several Celtics afterwards spoke highly of the Raps, especially the Raps’ hard play in the paint.
It also would’ve been embarrassing for the Celts to take a third game off The Raptors this season without Irving (and Hayward and others).
A brief scare after the first quarter, with the Raps accruing a season-low 14 points, and I was thinking, oh great, well, at least Boston aint doin much, either, and then TO managed to rally from that with a 29-point 2nd quarter.
With four games remaining, if the Raptors don’t get the one more win needed to secure home court I’ll be perturbed.
Too bad Kyle seemed a little embarrassedover the win.
Kryie Irving to miss the entire playoffs. Well, shit. The East just got much less interesting.
Here’s all you need to know about this years NBA Playoffs:
PHILADELPHIA CITY OF CHAMPIONS!!!!!:DHOW ABOUT DEM PACERS! What an exciting Game 3 comeback against the Cavs! Bojan Bogdanovic hit seven 3-pointers, tying a Pacers playoff record.
I never thought he was coming back in the first place. They are too wounded to make a run at the East champ game, but you never know. They ARE up 2-0 on the Bucks (they kinda suck…but are up by 20 on the Celts as we speak). I guess you never know.
YES YES YES! I think the Pacers winning this series is still unlikely (especially if Game 2 Lebron shows up the rest of the way) but an Indiana boy can dream. I was about to start an NBA playoffs thread since I hadn’t seen one, but this resurrection is timely.
I am rooting for 3 teams: The Pacers (my youngest son’s favorite team), the Celtics (my oldest son’s favorite) and the Pelicans (my favorite for the playoffs…don’t really have a fave NBA team overall, but root for anyone from UK, and Anthony Davis is by far the best of the lot).
The Pacers win today was crazy. They were down what, 17 at the half? I kept the game on in the background, wasn’t really paying attention, then I heard the announcer "Pacers up by 4 with (however many seconds left, 12.5, something like that?) and I raced back into the living room like “WTF happened here?” and watched the Pacers BARELY eke out a win there. That 3 by Love was pretty crazy.
Anyway, go Pelicans! I think with some of their newfound identities on offense during these playoffs that they can contest in the west. Rajon Rondo looks like a new man running the point, dishing like a mother grabber, and they aren’t relying solely on Davis, which I think other teams are mistaking them for as a weakness, a one-man show. They aren’t anymore.
Well, so much for the inevitability of another Warriors-Cleveland matchup in the finals that everyone was bitching about at the beginning of the year ;).
Well…it seemed inevitable then. Injuries have changed the landscape for many teams. Just ask the Celtics. Or even the Pelicans. Some teams have some crucial injuries.
Hoping Steady Freddie Van Vleet’s shoulder gets better for the Raptors ASAP. The bench hasn’t been so special in this series so far - they’re needing Are You Ready Freddie.
With their win last night in Game 3, the Pacers set an all-time record (regular-season and playoffs) for the most comeback wins in one season after being down at halftime by 10 points or more. Eight wins have come to us in that fashion.
Not a lot of love for the Sixers, especially after taking two in Miami and a 3-1 lead in the series. Belinelli and Ilyasova appear to have added serious veteran presence and offensive/defensive skill to a very young but balanced team. Not sure they are primed for a shot at the title, but if they can get through the Eastern Conference Finals anything is possible.
Man, I really wish they had won tonight though. That would have been huge and lent meaning to “stealing one in Cleveland”. As such, now the theoretical advantage swings back to Cleveland as they’ve now regained the extra home game advantage.
Did you watch, and any comments about refereeing? I saw a rant about pro-Cleveland calls, but don’t think it was by a very objective judge.
What a pathetic showing for Portland after a great post-break run. They were totally unprepared for NO’s energy and unable (or unwilling) to adjust their game. After losing two at home, they came out desperate and disorganized, giving up the ball 25 times. And allowing Davis and Holiday to score 88 points in game four was beyond pathetic. Olshey should be fired for his disastrous trades a few years ago, spending all the team’s money on marginal players. Now they’re stuck with a bunch of “nice guys” on the bench who add little to the game other than to be goofy cheerleaders from the sidelines.
I think the biggest post series takeaway is the utter futility of Lillard to get going, and Holliday’s incredible defensive job to frustrate him into bad shots over and over again.
I only watched in small pieces. My youngest son the Pacers fan agonized through it all. I let him stay up past his bedtime (usually 9:30, he’s 12) and at 11:00, after it was over, he yawned, looked at me and said “I stayed up for THIS?” and gestured at the TV. It was hilarious, poor guy. He was so tired the next morning, 6:30AM came around quickly for him.
The only one I saw in my 10 minutes of watching was James running into Oladipo after the latter went straight up in a textbook defense, then Oladipo getting called for the foul.
It’s nothing compared to Gorbert getting called for a foul when Westbrook was smacked by his own teammate or given a technical because he got hit in the beignets and refused to rise to the fight against both Felton and Westbrook (who left the bench to involve himself) last night.
It was to the point that I wouldn’t have been surprised if someone from the Jazz eviscerated the refs in the post-game conference.
The biggest shocker of the playoffs to me has been OKC’s complete collapse. I knew getting Carmelo for that kind of coin wasn’t the greatest idea in the world, but damn, what happened to that guy’s scoring? He’s flat out sucked in the playoffs.