Celtics Playoff Seeding Thread

[tarheelsxxiii]

Oh boy, Carroll just sprained his ankle. Toronto can ill afford losing anymore players for any significant time. They might be lucky to keep home court advantage at this rate if Carroll is out for any significant amount of time.

PJ Tucker will be good insurance for them going forward.

If we can hang on to 2nd, I think I'd prefer to see TOR drop to 3rd.  WASH seems like a bigger regular season threat, but TOR a bigger playoff threat. 

[jpotter33]

Great night for our playoff seeding!

The Toronto loss puts them 3.5 games back from us now, and they probably lost Carroll for a couple of games after rolling his ankle.

The Cavs loss puts them only 2.5 games above us for the number one seed!

Now only if the Blazers take care of the Nets and the Bulls take care of the Clippers (Griffin watch), it'll be a perfect basketball night for Celtics fans!

[jdz101]

Great night for our playoff seeding!

The Toronto loss puts them 3.5 games back from us now, and they probably lost Carroll for a couple of games after rolling his ankle.

The Cavs loss puts them only 2.5 games above us for the number one seed!

Now only if the Blazers take care of the Nets and the Bulls take care of the Clippers (Griffin watch), it'll be a perfect basketball night for Celtics fans!

The bolded is probably good for them to be honest. Carroll has been hot garbage this season.

[mef730]

I'm looking at the schedules and it's gotten a little tighter versus the Wizards. Rather than going through every game, I'm going to take a shortcut and look at how many "tough games" we have left. I'll define "tough" as top 4 in the conference (home team advantage).

Celtics: @LAC, @GS, CLE
Washington: @CLE, @LAC, @Utah @GS

We have two of our big 3 this week. Washington has all four of theirs in an eight day period at the end of the month. I'd love to come out of this week with two wins out of three, but one is probably more realistic.

We also play each other in Boston. Washington leads the season series 2-1 so, if we lose, we're in a big hole for the #2 slot.

Fortunately, we have a couple of factors in our favor:

With 19 games left, we only have eight left on the road. Washington has 21 games left and 15 of them are on the road. I'm hoping that schedule wears them down. Wall and Beal have been healthy and have played 59 and 57 games, respectively, of their total 61.

Even better: Washington has a brutal 18 games in March, including five back to backs. Ouch. Including tonight, we only have three.

And finally: Washington's last three games are 2X Miami and Detroit, teams that are battling for that last playoff spot. We've got Charlotte, Brooklyn and Milwaukee. Milwaukee is tied with Miami for ninth but, hopefully, they'll be eliminated by that last game so we can have the night off.

We've gotta get through these injuries and win the games we're supposed to win, since it doesn't look like the Wizards can be ruled out. Just ask Orlando last night.

Mike

[jpotter33]

Team            Record  Games Back

1. Cleveland     42-20    0
2. Boston         40-23    2.5
3. Washington  37-24    4.5
4. Toronto        37-26    5.5
5. Atlanta         34-28    8
6. Indiana         32-30    10
7. Chicago        31-31    11
8. Detroit         30-32    12
9. Miami           30-34    13
10. Milwaukee   29-33    13

Bold = games still yet to be played tonight/yet to be determined

Relevant Games:

Miami beats Cleveland

Milwaukee beats Philadelphia

Boston at LAC

Chicago at Detroit

Golden State at Atlanta

Indiana at Charlotte


Tonight is another big night for our standings. The Cavs inexplicably lost to the Heat at home again tonight, giving us another opportunity to come within two games of catching them for the number one seed. With as rough as their schedule is down the stretch and their tendency to rest guys for the playoffs, it's still very possible to catch them, even with our continued blundered games. But we can't continue to have games like last night, and we really, really need to try and take two of the next three games at LAC, GS, and Denver. Tall task, but it's doable.

[chilidawg]

TP for the updates.

[jambr380]

Tonight is another big night for our standings. The Cavs inexplicably lost to the Heat at home again tonight, giving us another opportunity to come within two games of catching them for the number one seed. With as rough as their schedule is down the stretch and their tendency to rest guys for the playoffs, it's still very possible to catch them, even with our continued blundered games. But we can't continue to have games like last night, and we really, really need to try and take two of the next three games at LAC, GS, and Denver. Tall task, but it's doable.

Love the updates - thanks for keeping it current!

But I think Cavs fans probably think the same way tonight as we did last night. In fact, that is now back to back losses against the Heat. If we look at how they did just before the All-Star break in Jan, they had some solid losses against the Pelicans, Blazers, Mavericks, Kings, and Bulls (among others). I guess what it proves is even the best teams have let downs.

But I agree, if we are to catch them, we need to win the gimmes.

[mr. dee]

Now we need to beat Washington to regain the #2 spot. Thanks for blowing up yesterday's game.

[jpotter33]

Well, with that loss, Washington is now just 1.5 games back from us. What's more, it's not a "true" 1.5 games back either. We're tied in the loss column, but they've simply played 3 fewer games than us, meaning they're 3 wins back. So they're a very real danger to surpass us in the standings, though of course they have a pretty difficult schedule to do that with.

But ultimately, we'll more than likely have to win our game at home against Washington in order to keep the second see. Not only would that help us record-wise, it'd also more than likely give us the tiebreaker if we end up with a tied record. Here's the playoff tiebreaker procedures:

(-) Tie breaker not needed (better overall winning percentage)
(1) Division leader wins tie from team not leading a division
(2) Head-to-head won-lost percentage
(3) Division won-lost percentage
(4) Conference won-lost percentage
(5) W-L Percentage vs. Playoff teams, own conference
(6) W-L Percentage vs. Playoff teams, other conference
(7) Net Points, all games

So since we'd be both be divisional leaders and tied in the head-to-head matchup, it'd go to division won-lost percentage. Luckily, we have some pretty bad teams in our division, and so far we've gone 8-4 against our division, while still having 4 games against the three worst teams in our division in the Nets (2), 76ers (1), and Knicks (1). Washington, on the other hand, is currently 6-5 in their division, and they still have 5 games left against Charlotte (2), Atlanta (1), and Miami (2), all of which will be difficult games for them given they're all in the playoff hunt.

If somehow we end up tied in the divisional record, then it goes to the conference record next, which we also have an edge on them with. We're currently at 26-12 compared to their 25-16, which is a significant lead with the schedule we have the rest of the way.

Thus, as long as we win against the Wizards at home in a couple of weeks, we'll more than likely own the tiebreaker against them, so that game is going to be extremely important for the race for the number 2 seed.

[jpotter33]

Also, the Wizards are in a really tough road stretch right now. They're getting ready to play a stretch of 4 games in 5 nights all on the road with the second night of each back to back against tough opponents.

They play tomorrow night in Phoenix, followed by a really tough game in Denver the very next night. Then two days later they start with the Kings on Friday night and end up with the Trailblazers on Saturday night. So they could very well go 2-2 on that trip, giving us some breathing room, though we still really, really need to win at least one of these next two road games to keep the pressure on them.

[jpotter33]

Phoenix has come back and is currently up by 6 over Washington in the 3rd! Let's hope they can pull off this crap game like they did last night with us.

[jpotter33]

Phoenix has come back and is currently up by 6 over Washington in the 3rd! Let's hope they can pull off this crap game like they did last night with us.

Scratch that - now they're straight up DOMINATING the Wizards up 11. I just turned on the game, and they put on three straight HUGE blocks on Beal and Gortat on three straight fastbreak opportunities, which led to a Len dunk and a Warren three pointer.

Phoenix owes us this one after gifting them that game the other night.

[saltlover]

Phoenix has come back and is currently up by 6 over Washington in the 3rd! Let's hope they can pull off this crap game like they did last night with us.

Now up 11.  20-2 run to start the third quarter.

[jpotter33]

Well, the Suns didn't beat the Wizards, but they really made them work. They'll have a tough time beating Denver in Denver on the second night of a back to back.

But again, they're now just one game (2 wins) back from us in the standings.

[j804]

Why didn't we grab Bogdanovic?

Hurts to see these mid season pick ups killing it