The Houston Rockets essentially went wire-to-wire as the best team in the NBA. Coach Mike D’Antoni guided his team to win streaks of 17, 14 and 11 games, and James Harden emerged as an MVP candidate while showing he could share the court with Chris Paul, a ball-dominant guard acquired in the offseason to help this team get over the hump.
Not to be outdone, the Golden State Warriors kept pace with Houston for most of the season until a knee injury has sidelined two-time MVP Steph Curry since late March, with Coach Steve Kerr insisting Curry would not play in the first round of the playoffs.
The Boston Celtics have injury concerns of their own. The team lost star Kyrie Irving to a knee injury for the season, including the playoffs, and have gone 8-6 in his absence, outscoring opponents by just 1.2 net points per 100 possessions. They had the fourth-highest net rating (plus-4.3) with Irving available to play.
The Cleveland Cavaliers, meanwhile, are trending in the opposite direction. Since the trade deadline, LeBron James and his team went 19-9 and are outscoring opponents by 4.9 net points per 100 possessions, a huge improvement over the time prior (minus-0.6) and giving them a chance to earn James his fourth championship ring.
So how will it all shake out? Our postseason probabilities are based on the win rates that fuel our weekly power rankings and take into account a team’s actual win-loss record; its expected win-loss record based on points scored and allowed, also known as its Pythagorean winning percentage; and its regressed win-loss record to account for a small sample size of only 82 games played.
As the NBA playoffs unfold, we’ll provide updated win probabilities for every team at the conclusion of every series.
We start with a close look a this season’s title favorite, and it’s not the Warriors or Cavaliers.
Houston Rockets
Chances to win NBA title:Â 41 percent
The Rockets lead the league in net rating (plus-8.8) and have one of the most efficient offenses in NBA history, scoring 115.2 points per 100 possessions per Basketball Reference. The key is their shot selection: 82 percent of their field goal attempts are either at the rim or behind the three-point line, two of the most efficient shots available on the court. By comparison, the average NBA team combines those two shot types for 65 percent of their attempts in 2017-18. Houston has also been the best team in transition this season, scoring more than half the time (51 percent) with 1.2 points per possession.
Toronto Raptors
Chances to win NBA title:Â 22 percent
DeMar DeRozan made some changes to his game this season, most notably attempting more shots from behind the three-point line. That boosted his effective field goal rate (49 percent) to its highest point since his rookie season (50.2 percent in 2009-10), while also increasing his box plus-minus, a box score estimate of the points per 100 possessions a player contributed above a league-average player, translated to an average team, to a career-high (plus-2.1).
As a result, the Raptors are better than ever. Their offensive rating (111.1) is a franchise high and behind only the high-octane scoring machines found in Houston and Golden State. Defensively they allow 103.3 points per 100 possessions, fifth lowest in the NBA during the regular season.
Cleveland Cavaliers
Chances to win NBA title:Â 11 percent
If not for Harden, LeBron James would be the consensus MVP. The 33-year-old is scoring 27.7 points per game to go along with 8.7 rebounds and 9.2 assists, all while playing a league-leading 37.2 minutes per game. His average game score (24.2), a rough measure of a player’s productivity for a single game, is only a few ticks behind Anthony Davis (24.5) and Harden (24.4) for the league lead, and only Russell Westbrook (25) has more triple-doubles than James (18) this season.
Here’s how the rest of the NBA stacks up. The Warriors’ championship hopes will increase if and when Curry returns to the lineup.
