The NBA is dark tonight. All eyes will be on Atlanta, where Louisville and Michigan will play for the NCAA national championship.
So this gives us time to reflect …
With 10 days remaining in the regular season, what are the 10 biggest unanswered questions from around the league?
We’ll take them in order of importance.
1. Will the Los Angeles Lakers make the playoffs? Since 1976-77, the Lakers have made the postseason in all but two seasons. But after getting swept in the season series Sunday by the Los Angeles Clippers while looking particularly inept on defense, is this going to be a year when the purple and gold sit out? The Lakers begin the final 10 days sitting in ninth place in the Western Conference standings, a half-game behind Utah after the Jazz prevented Golden State from clinching a playoff berth with a particularly impressive road victory before a crowd of 19,956 – Golden State’s 29th sellout. But the Lakers’ half-game deficit is deceiving, because they would lose a tiebreaker to the Jazz if the teams finish with the same record (Utah won the season series, 2-1). The Lakers play four of their final five games at home (the exception being a trip to Portland) against New Orleans, Golden State, San Antonio and Houston. The Jazz have four games left, the first two at home against Oklahoma City and Minnesota; the latter two on the road against Minnesota and Memphis. If Utah goes 2-2, the Lakers will need to go 4-1.
2. Can the Milwaukee Bucks catch the Boston Celtics for the No. 7 seed in the East? We can only hope so, a point we hammered home last week with our BucksNation posts and this column by Chris Bernucca. Let’s face it, wouldn’t we all rather see a Celtics-Heat first-round series than a Bucks-Heat first round series? Kevin Garnett returned Sunday night after missing eight games with an inflamed ankle, and the Celtics defeated Washington. Milwaukee now trails Boston by 2 1/2 games and likely will need to win five of its final six, which isn’t going to be easy. The NBA schedule makers gave them a finishing six-pack that includes five road games, including trips to Oklahoma City (33-6 at home) and Miami (33-4 at home). Their lone remaining home game is against Denver. That means the Bucks absolutely must get wins Wednesday at Orlando on the second night of a back-to-back, then two more Friday and Saturday in a road back-to-back against Atlanta and Charlotte. The Celtics’ final five are at home vs. Brooklyn, at Miami, at Orlando, at home vs. Indiana and at Toronto on the final night of the season. BucksNation has one extra glimmer of hope: Milwaukee owns the tiebreaker edge from beating Boston 3-1 in the season series.
3. Who is the NBA Coach of the Year? No postseason award race is more wide-open than this one. And for voters, what will be the determining question? Will votes go to the coach who most exceeded preseason expectations (Mark Jackson, Kevin McHale, George Karl)? Will it go to the coach who guided his team to a very respectable finish despite being without his best player (Frank Vogel, Tom Thibodeau)? Will Mike Woodson inject himself into the picture if the Knicks run the table and finish the season with an 18-game winning streak? (He is 68-32 in his first 100 games.) Will there be support for Erik Spoelstra, who turned around an extended period of midseason malaise and coaxed a 27-game winning streak out of the defending champion Miami Heat? Does someone throw a first-place vote to Bernie Bickerstaff for the interim job he did between the Mike Brown firing and the Mike D’Antoni hiring? Does Lionel Hollins, who publicly criticized the Rudy Gay trade, get his props for guiding his rebuilt team to a possible home-court advantage in the first round of the playoffs? (It won’t matter if they finish fifth – home court goes to the team with the better record) We’ll have more on this later this week.
4. Who will win the scoring title? Carmelo Anthony moved ahead of Kevin Durant for the league lead by dropping 36 on the Thunder at the ‘Peake on Sunday afternoon. ‘Melo is at 28.44 points per game; KD is at 28.35. You wonder how much it matters to each of them, because both say it means nothing – but that is the diplomatic thing to say. ‘Melo has always had a superiority complex when it comes to competing against Durant, who was the next great thing to come out of the Baltimore-D.C. area after ‘Melo left for Syracuse and then the NBA. Durant is the three-time defending scoring champion, and there hasn’t been a player to win four scoring titles in a row since Michael Jordan won seven straight from 1987-93. Wilt Chamberlain is the only other player to win at least four scoring titles in a row. Players who did it in three straight seasons included George Gervin, Bob McAdoo, Neil Johnston and George Mikan. And if ‘Melo wins it (and the Knicks run the table), will it earn Anthony the coveted runner-up finish behind LeBron James in MVP voting? That was the subject of debate Sunday night on Twitter after our latest rankings were published.
5. How many coaches will get fired on Thursday, April 18? There is no shortage of candidates, from Mike D’Antoni in Los Angeles all the way down to Mike Dunlap in Charlotte. Two coaches will carry interim tags into the playoffs – P.J. Carlesimo in Brooklyn and Jim Boylan in Milwaukee, and there are some studs out there in the coaching free agent ranks, including Jeff Van Gundy (Brooklyn?), Stan Van Gundy (Clippers?), Scott Skiles (probably needs a year off) and Phil Jackson (says he won’t coach again, but has been known to change his mind) among them. Also, Hollins in Memphis and Vinny Del Negro in Los Angeles will be judged on their postseason performances. Both might need to advance to the conference finals to keep their posts. Byron Scott in Cleveland, Lawrence Frank in Detroit, Keith Smart in Sacramento and Lindsey Hunter in Phoenix are all teetering. Could be quite the bloody Thursday on the day after the season ends.
6. What is going to happen to Dwight Howard when he becomes an unrestricted free agent? The latest gossip out of Los Angeles from our numerous spies is that the Lakers are confident Howard will remain with the Lakers even if they miss the playoffs, even if management is going to have to eat the remainder of D’Antoni’s contract in order to facilitate him staying. But remember this: Dwight has been waiting his entire career to be the alpha dog on the free agency scene, and he has been known to change his mind in an eyeblink. (Remember when he opted into the final year of his contract with Orlando?) Dallas will have the max cap space to go after him and pair him with the ultimate stretch-4, Dirk Nowitzki. Houston can make a trade to clear enough cap space to play him alongside James Harden. Atlanta is his hometown, and the Hawks will have max cap space. And at some point, someone is going to inform Dwight that the Lakers are going to be in a monster rebuilding mode when every player on the roster (except Stave Nash with a partial guarantee) comes off the cap at the conclusion of next season. And it ain’t easy rebuilding without future draft picks, which the Lakers have already sacrificed.
7. How high will the Greek Freak rise between now and the NBA Draft?