For any team with ambitions of a long playoff run, it usually makes sense to avoid the teams at the top of the standings. But according to league analyst Nick Wright, the best path for the Lakers is actually the one that takes them on a collision course with the defending NBA champions in the very first round.
“Even though they’re the 9 seed, the Lakers appear to me to have the most upside,” said Nick Wright on “The Volume” sports. “The Lakers should want Denver in round one. If you have to beat them no matter what, do you want them in round two when you just went six or seven with Minnesota or OKC and they swept whoever they were playing, do you want them in round three where there are games every other day, or do you want them in round one where there’s two or three days between games. LeBron and AD can both play 44 minutes. You are as fresh as you are going to be at any point.”
For Wright, it's not about the Lakers being better than the Nuggets. It's not even that their odds against Denver are better than any other team. But for any squad in the West hoping to compete for a title, the road runs through Denver at some point, and Nikola Jokic is going to have something to say.
For a Lakers team hoping to narrowly escape elimination, they’ll have to win two games just to even get into the playoffs. But by the time they are there, a matchup with the Nuggets will tell us everything we need to know about the Lakers and about how the Nuggets stack up to the rest of the West.
A Western Conference Finals Rematch In 2024?
After last night’s miracle win over the Bucks, the Lakers moved up to 40-32 on the season, two games back from the Suns and 2.5 games ahead of the Golden State Warriors. With just a few weeks before the end of the season, the standings are likely fixed now and the Lakers will have to accept however the bracket ends up.
Currently, at 9th in the West, the Lakers are deep in play-in territory and would have to win two games (one on the road) just for a chance to face the West’s top seed.
While their lead over the Thunder is only half a game, the Nuggets sit atop the West right now, ready to face whoever it is that wins the 8th and final playoff spot.
Most Lakers fans are dreading a rematch with the MVP and his unstoppable ball club but it may be better for the Lakers to face this challenge early instead of fighting through two rounds only to fail in the end. If they get lucky, a path to the Finals could open up for them but they’ll have to take care of business in the regular season first before we can talk about a potential playoff run.
After being swept by the Nuggets already, the Lakers can’t do much worse than last year but the pressure is still on for them to make something of this campaign and come out with something to show for their efforts after so much work to keep the season alive.
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