Players get a little rest, then hit hectic finish
And now, they rest.
Until Thursday, anyway. That’s when the NBA comes back for a frantic eight-week sprint to the finish of the regular season, with teams having from anywhere between 25 and 29 games left to play before the 16-team field for the playoffs is filled and set.
The Nuggets return to action Friday night at the Oklahoma City Thunder.
The All-Star Game is over, Team LeBron defeating Team Giannis 157-155 in Chicago on Sunday night. Most players scurried onto private jets not long after the final buzzer for quick little getaways — places like Miami, Turks and Caicos, and the Bahamas (where some union meetings start Monday) were among the destinations.
So, the players will try to enjoy their last bit of relaxation as the playoff push is about to get real.
“Obviously, when you come to All-Star Weekend, basketball is going to be the main thing and the main thing only,” Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James said in Chicago. “That’s why you’re here. That’s what you see every day. We’re dedicated to this weekend for not only ourselves and our family, but for the fans. So, I try to find a couple days after All-Star, after Sunday, to kind of just get away from the game, try to freshen back up and get ready for the last run of the regular season.”
There are 12 teams that start Thursday: Milwaukee, Detroit, Miami, Atlanta, Brooklyn, Philadelphia, Charlotte, Chicago, Memphis, Sacramento, Houston and Golden State. Every other team resumes play Friday except for the Los Angeles Clippers, who get a couple extra days of break and won’t get back on the floor until Saturday afternoon.
For the most part, the postseason teams are largely set. Milwaukee could clinch a playoff berth as early as this coming weekend. The Bucks — 46-8 — are quietly on pace for the third-best regular season in NBA history. They’re seven games in the loss column ahead of Toronto in the race for No. 1 in the Eastern Conference, four losses clear of the Lakers in the race for the league’s best overall record.
“Our job is to take it, obviously, day by day,” said Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo, the NBA’s reigning MVP. “We want to win as many games as possible, but our goal is to win the whole thing. So obviously, as I said, you want to win every game. If you win every game, that would be great. But we cannot lose focus. We can’t lose track of our actual goal, which is get better every day, keep learning every day, and win the whole thing.”
Toronto, a team that many suspected would freefall after Kawhi Leonard and Danny Green left for the Los Angeles Clippers in free agency, hits the break with the NBA’s third-best record at 40-15. The Raptors, Boston, Miami, Philadelphia and Indiana can pretty much start making their East playoff plans. Out in the Western Conference, the Lakers, Denver, the Clippers, Utah, Houston, Oklahoma City and Dallas all have separated themselves in the playoff race as well.
That’s 13 teams for 16 spots. In the East, Brooklyn and Orlando will seek to hang on to the last two spots. Out West, No. 8 Memphis has a fourgame lead on Portland and is five games up on San Antonio — a team that hasn’t missed the playoffs since 1997, but has some serious work to do in order to extend that streak.