The Cleveland Cavaliers beat the OKC Thunder last night, ending Oklahoma City’s winning streak at 15 while extending their own to 11. The Cavs are now 32-4 on the season, which is four games ahead of where the Celtics were last season at this time. Not only that, their .889 winning percentage would put them at 73 wins this season, tying the NBA record.
The Cavs are having a hell of a season.
Are they as good as the 73-win Warriors? No. That's a team everyone expected to be good while even the most optimistic Cavs predictions had them in the low to mid-50-win range. At this point, they’ll probably fall somewhere in the middle, which would make for an incredible season.
The Celtics, meanwhile, are 27-10. On January 9, 2024, they were 28-8, so despite some people feeling a little down on them thanks to an inconsistent December, they are pretty close to where they were a year ago.
It might be too early to start worrying about seeding, but not by much. Boston trails Cleveland by 5.5 games, six in the loss column. They still have two more games against the Cavs, which would give them two quick games to gain on the top seed and the tiebreaker if they win. Their current 73% pace would make the Celtics a 60-win team, which would mean the Cavs would have to finish the season 28-18 to tie Boston at 60.
All things considered, that's a tough ask.
If the Celtics want to chase the top seed, they'll have to pick up the pace. The Cavs might level off some, but they'll not drop from winning 89% of their games to 60% of their games. If we split the difference and say they finish at a 75% win pace, that puts them at 34 or 35 more wins.
Kristaps Porzingis said after the win in Denver that he feels like the Celtics are on the verge of a run. They’ll need to if they are going to get to 66 or 67 wins. They need to go 40-5 the rest of the way. Or to put it more simply, the Celtics and Cavs would have to flip winning percentages.
Could they? Sure, but I wouldn’t bet on it.
Boston’s remaining schedule is currently collectively below .500 (.478) while Cleveland’s is at .506. The Celtics could certainly feast the rest of the way, but Cleveland would probably have to suffer a misfortune or two to drop the way the Celtics need them to.
The next question is, does it matter?
Under the current circumstances, not only might it not matter, it might be helpful.
Obviously, things will change a lot over the next few months, but let’s assume Boston has to face the 7th seed first and then the 3-6 winner to get to Cleveland instead of the 8th seed and the 4-5 winner.
I'm not afraid of whoever comes out of the Miami, Detroit, Atlanta, Chicago group. The 3-6 series would be New York and Indiana while the 4-5 is Milwaukee and Orlando. As much as Indiana gives Boston problems, I’m betting New York gets out of that series and the Celtics can handle the Knicks. At the same time, I would like to push Orlando off to someone else because I’m not fond of that matchup. I’m not worried about it per se, but I’m assuming Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner will be 100% for that series and I’d like to avoid that for Boston.
So let Cleveland deal with the big, physical teams. And if the Cavs and Celtics meet in the playoffs, I’m not worried about Boston winning a game or two on the road. I still like the matchup against the Cavs and think the Celtics still hold advantages that can be exploited.
I don’t want to go much deeper into this stuff because all of these matchups will change so much over the next month. Philadelphia could enter this mix and change everything. I am just mentioning them to say there's a path to the matchups working out for Boston as the second seed.
The Cavs are running away with the East right now, which is fine. They are on a mission. I’ve said this before, but they really do remind me of last year’s Celtics in that they are motivated by prior failures and getting incredible performances from just about everyone on the roster. They are responding well to a new coach and riding this momentum to wins they wouldn’t have won last season.
Good for them. They're a great story. People are talking about them as potential champions.
The Celtics should be listening if for nothing else, to hear how quickly everyone is to move on from them at the slightest hint of weakness. This is Joe Mazzulla’s “nobody cares” in a nutshell. Boston lost to OKC, OKC lost to Cleveland, and now the Cavs are the darlings of the league.
The Celtics are tossed into the boring bin. The national media has no idea how to cover them, casual fans only see 3-pointers, and the league has new, shiny objects to look at. Nobody really cares about them anymore.
Maybe this can be a little motivation for a team that seemed a little sleepy during the holidays. As far as I’m concerned, the second seed is fine. The Celtics have no need to do anything but run their race right now. This is only mile nine in the marathon of the 2024-25 NBA season. So what if competitors are sprinting ahead right now?
The Celtics are on a good pace and in a good position to win this thing. They’ll start to pick things up soon enough. The most important thing is that they have the best closing kick, and that should be their focus. They're probably not going to lead the pack anymore, but all they need to do is have it when it matters most so they can be the ones to break the tape.
