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Heat coach Erik Spoelstra was asked about his methods for making sure Bam Adebayo had a chance to go beyond Kobe Bryant’s 81 points. Spo said, “I’m apologizing to nobody.” Heck yeah. When it comes to celebrating “a rather melancholy footnote” in NBA history, I, too, apologize to nobody.
Parade of parity
Can stats tell us who is going to win it all?
Adam Silver’s age of parity began in 2019 when the Raptors ended the Warriors’ reign. From there, we’ve had a different champion every single year, though the Thunder are looking to end that this postseason. I started wondering if there was anything from certain team stats that could clue us in to who this year’s champion might be.
I looked at offensive, defensive and net ratings. I looked at the four factors of basketball. I even looked at just 3-point shooting in general. Here are the average ranks of the eventual NBA champs and their ranges. We’ll figure out the 2026 champ on the other side of it all.
Offensive rating: Average rank: 6.3; range: 1-15.
Defensive rating: Average rank: 5.6; range: 1-15.
Net rating: Average rank: 3.1; range: 1-6.
The top six offenses in the NBA belong to Denver, Boston, New York, San Antonio, Charlotte and Cleveland. Interestingly enough, the Thunder are seventh in offense — just outside the average champion. The top six defenses are OKC, Detroit, San Antonio, Miami and Boston. The Raptors and Knicks are tied for sixth. The top three net ratings are the Thunder, Celtics and Pistons. Boston is the only team currently to fall into the average rank for all three categories.
Let’s move on to the four factors. The opponent averages show where each team ranks at preventing a good number in those categories. The smaller the number, the better you are against your opponents.
eFG percentage: Average: 3.1 | Opponent average: 6.1
Free-throw rate: Average: 20.7 | Opponent average: 13.0
Turnover rate: Average: 14.7 | Opponent average: 12.9
Offensive rebounding rate: Average: 13.7 | Opponent average: 10.4
You have to be able to make shots to be a champion in today’s NBA. And it helps when you’re good at preventing shots from going in. Incredible analysis, I know. Getting to the free-throw line isn’t important, but not giving up a lot of free throws is. Turnover rate doesn’t totally matter. In fact, champs between 2019-2023 ranked between 12th to 29th in taking care of the ball, though Boston and OKC the last two years ranked first. And you need to grab defensive boards.
The Nuggets, Lakers and Bucks are the three best teams at making shots efficiently. OKC, Detroit, San Antonio, Boston, Houston and Miami prevent them the best. The Thunder, Nuggets, Spurs and Celtics all do well preventing free-throw rates. San Antonio, New York, Denver and Boston are top-10 defensive rebounding squads.
Now let’s check out how important 3-point volume and accuracy are:
3-point volume: Average: 11.7 | Opponent average: 19.3
3-point accuracy: Average: 7.1 | Opponent average: 7.7
You don’t need to shoot a ton of them, but you’d better be able to make and prevent them. Potential contenders in the top seven in accuracy are Denver, New York and Minnesota. Detroit is the only potential contender in the top eight in preventing 3-pointers from going in.
So what does all this mean?
The Thunder, Pistons and Knicks tick the third-most boxes for all these categories. The Nuggets and Spurs check in with the second-most. And the Celtics have the top statistical profile for a champion with a month to go — and that’s almost entirely without Jayson Tatum. I guess this means Boston is going to beat either Denver or San Antonio in the finals? I actually don’t know if this means anything, but I looked it up, so there you go.
The last 24
🏀 Nailed it. Marcus Thompson III got it right with this Adebayo column. Let’s just appreciate the moment.
🎤 Amazing story. Nets radio announcer Chris Carrino has a form of muscular dystrophy. He was just named to the Hall of Fame.
🏀 Uh oh. The Warriors are still waiting for Steph Curry’s knee to be better. Shutting him down is on the table.
👑 Unselfish king. As whispers grow that the Lakers might be better off without LeBron James, he returned last night and emphasized that he’ll do whatever is best for the team.
😲 Surprise players. The Heat’s Pelle Larsson and the Celtics’ Neemias Queeta top John Hollinger’s list of breakout guys emerging at the right time.
Stream the NBA on Fubo (try it for free!) and catch out-of-market games on League Pass.
Challengers
Do we need to change the review system?
After the Cavaliers lost to the Magic on Wednesday, Donovan Mitchell raised questions about the challenge system in the NBA. He felt like there were plays that should have been reviewed late in that game. However, the Cavs couldn’t challenge those plays because they’d already used and won two challenges.
“Maybe I’m biased because it happened to us twice in game-ending situations the past two and a half or three weeks, but they are game-changing plays,” Mitchell explained. “It happened in Detroit. It happened here. Both of them on TV. I don’t know what the rule should be. If you’re winning challenges, especially on calls that are very obvious, I think it’s something that should be talked about.”
Cleveland’s two challenges in the game were on an out-of-bounds call against James Harden in the first quarter and a foul call against Keon Ellis in the third. Both times, the refs got it wrong. Both times, Cleveland didn’t capitalize on the next possession. But Mitchell and others have wondered if you should keep getting another challenge if you keep winning them.
It’s an interesting idea to keep rewarding teams that are technically wronged by the officials. But what should the limit be for challenges, even if the coach keeps making successful ones? Wouldn’t that potentially bog down games in a way the NBA has been trying to avoid? Should teams just stop wasting them early in games regardless of outcome? I’m not sure, but these would be my proposed changes:
Make them quick: I think if you can’t tell that a call should be reversed in 30 seconds, the call stands.
No more super slow-mo and frame-by-frame analysis. We’re officiating a basketball game, not solving a cold-case file.
Have Secaucus review everything. Refs on site shouldn’t do this. Have an expert in the command center do it, and the lead official can convey the ruling
About last night
Thunder top Celtics in potential finals preview
Thunder 104, Celtics 102: That’s right. This might have been our third potential NBA Finals preview of the last week or so. Unfortunately, we didn’t see Tatum, Derrick White or Jalen Williams in this one. Still an awesome game between the previous two NBA champs. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander did it again. He cracked 20 points for the 127th consecutive regular-season game he’s played in, breaking te record Wilt Chamberlain held for 60-plus years.
SGA finished with 35 points and hit the go-ahead bucket with 30.1 seconds left. Then Jaylen Brown answered with 22.6 seconds left. Chet Holmgren got fouled on a rebound and hit the winning free throws with 0.8 seconds left. I wouldn’t hate seven games of these two teams healthy.
Nuggets 136, Spurs 131: Victor Wembanyama sat out this game with ankle soreness. The Spurs could have used Wemby in the second half when the Nuggets (41-26) erased a 20-point deficit to come back and win. Nikola Jokić had 31 points, 20 rebounds, 12 assists, three steals and two blocks. It’s just the third game in NBA history with at least 30 points, 20 boards, 10 assists, three steals and two blocks. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar had one. Jokić now has two. Jamal Murray had 16 of his 39 in the final quarter, and Spencer Jones had 12 of his 19 in the fourth.
Pistons 131, 76ers 109: The Pistons bench combined for 69 points as Detroit cruised.
Heat 112, Bucks 105: Adebayo had 21 points to give him 104 points in his last two games. Giannis Antetokounmpo had 31 points, but Milwaukee (27-38) is now six games out of 10th. Go jump in the Dunk Tank!
Speaking of which …
Suns 123, Pacers 108: Devin Booker dropped 43 points, and Jalen Green had 35. Ivica Zubac made his Pacers debut. He had eight points and six boards in 16 minutes. He did not play in the second half. Tank score of 9/10 for Indiana.
Magic 136, Wizards 131 (OT): Bilal Coulibaly had 13 of his 29 points in the fourth quarter to force overtime. Jalen Suggs had 28 points, and nobody cracked 80 by themselves. The Wizards get a 9/10 tank score because they sat Trae Young and Tre Johnson after the third quarter.
Hawks 108, Nets 97: Jalen Johnson’s 21-9-9 stat line was enough to overcome Josh Minott’s 24 points off the bench. The Nets get a 10/10 tank score. Why so high? Check out this first-quarter defense.
Mavericks 120, Grizzlies 112: Khris Middleton had 35 off the bench. Cooper Flagg had 13 points on 16 shots. Tank scores of 0/10 for Dallas and 8/10 for Memphis.
Lakers 142, Bulls 130: Luka Dončić had 51 points, 10 rebounds and nine assists. Austin Reaves had 30, and Deandre Ayton had 23. That’s a 7/10 tank score for Chicago.
Your Tanker of the Week: the Wizards.
I totaled up the Dunk Tank scores for this week, as per the suggestion of our great college football newsletter writer, Jason Kirk. We ended up with two teams totaling 29 on the tank score: the Nets and the Wizards. The tie goes to the team that gave up 83 points to one player.
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