The Detroit Pistons have a commanding 5.5 game lead in the East (as of Saturday afternoon). Behind them are the Boston Celtics, New York Knicks, and Cleveland Cavaliers, all bunched up within a game and a half of each other. It is worth noting that the Raptors are 3.5 games out of 2nd place as well.
The Celtics have the slight edge at the moment, and they could potentially be getting back Jayson Tatum any day now. But clearly this race is far from over.
Looking to the strength of remaining schedule (via Tankathon), the Celtics have the 6th most difficult schedule remaining. They play the Thunder twice, as well as the Spurs, Nuggets, Cavs, and Knicks.
In contrast, the Cavs have the 26th hardest remaining schedule (5th easiest) and the Knicks have the 20th. The Cavs are also 9-1 in their last 10 have have gotten a big boost from adding James Harden to their lineup. Sure, he hasn’t exactly delivered in the playoffs, but he’s a regular season stats machine that helps teams stack wins.
The last few months are also always kind of fluky when you factor in tanking teams, lame duck players and coaches, load management, and teams that have nothing left to play for after their seed is locked in.
With all that said, the next couple of weeks could be critical to the seedings. So where do you see the Celtics finishing and who do you think ends up with the 2 seed?