
The Thunder also eked out a win over James Wiseman’s Detroit Pistons, but the Warriors probably don’t need to worry about them.

The Lakers hold the tiebreaker so it would behoove the Dubs to not leave them an opening. The Lakers won again, beating the Chicago Bulls, and pulled to within 1.5 games of the Warriors. The Suns have a 1.5 game lead over the Warriors, hold the tiebreaker, and are finally healthy. Phoenix’s win over Minnesota was good for Golden State, but also mostly shut the door on the Dubs reaching the fourth spot. The dream of the fourth seed is probably dead. The dream of the fifth seed isn’t dead yet, though the focus is firmly on staying out of the play-in tournament, rather than rising in the standings.
#Nba western conference divisions plus
Not super likely, but not impossible either, seeing as how the Clippers are without Paul George, and have a very difficult final stretch: another road game against the Grizzlies, plus road games against the Pelicans and Suns, and home games against the Lakers and Blazers.
#Nba western conference divisions full
Instead, the Clippers moved a full game ahead of the Dubs in the standings, meaning the Warriors have to win two more games than LAC over the final five-game stretch. With a loss, the Clippers and Warriors would have had the same record, but LA holds the tiebreaker. The Wolves are at home against the Los Angeles Lakers, Blazers, and New Orleans Pelicans, with road contests versus the Brooklyn Nets and Spurs.Įlsewhere on Wednesday, the Los Angeles Clippers eked out a win over the Memphis Grizzlies, which definitely hurt the Warriors. The Warriors have home games against the San Antonio Spurs and Oklahoma City Thunder, with road contests against the Denver Nuggets, Sacramento Kings, and Portland Trail Blazers. You be the judge of how likely that will be. But as long as Golden State does as well over their final five games as Minnesota does, then the Dubs will stay in front. If they finish with the same record, the Wolves will leapfrog the Warriors. That pushed the Dubs a full game ahead of the Wolves in the standings, which is vital because Minnesota holds the tiebreaker. Most of Wednesday’s results did not go in the Warriors favor, but one crucial contest did: old friend Kevin Durant returned to the court for the Phoenix Suns, and helped them beat the Minnesota Timberwolves. So, after Wednesday’s slew of games, it’s time to look at where things stand entering Thursday morning. The jumped back up a spot after Tuesday’s comeback win over the New Orleans Pelicans, and the standings got another shakeup on Wednesday with the bulk of the teams that are jockeying for position playing. It only took a few hours for everything I wrote to change because of that night’s games, with the Warriors dropping a spot without playing. On Monday I posted a Western Conference standings update, so we could all see where the Golden State Warriors were with less than two weeks left in the season.
