Haters of the NBA are feeling very vindicated right about now.
Needless to say, the National Basketball Association’s postseason has left a lot to be desired. There have been a few intriguing storylines and competitive series (the Indiana Pacers-New York Knicks series was a lot of fun), but all in all, the playoffs have been derailed by a number of key injuries.
It’s really been a war of attrition for NBA teams this postseason. The squads with the lesser amount of injuries have generally moved on, and many of the games have been blowouts, with a few exceptions. And now, in the Western Conference and Eastern Conference Finals, the series have been as lopsided as they come.
The one-seeded Boston Celtics had a cake walk to the NBA Finals. Though they are far and above the best team in the league, at least on paper, they met little resistance on their way to the championship series. The Celtics beat a depleted Miami Heat team 4-1, then faced off against a starless Cleveland Cavaliers team, also winning that seven game series 4-1. Last night, they finished off an Indiana Pacers team (without their best player) and swept them 4-0 in the Eastern Conference Finals.
The Celtics' route to the NBA Finals 👀 pic.twitter.com/BSIn9LPj4l
— NBA on ESPN (@ESPNNBA) May 28, 2024
And on the other side of the bracket, the Dallas Mavericks are comfortably in the driver’s seat in the Western Conference Finals. They are up 3-0 on a Minnesota Timberwolves team who shocked the sports world by taking down the defending champion Denver Nuggets. After they did that, a lot of people started to pin them as the team of destiny, but that narrative has quickly changed now that they’re in a spot that no team has ever come back from (down 3-0).
The Mavericks are in great position to become only the second ever team to make it to the NBA Finals as a five seed. After much conversation last year about whether or not stars Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving could work together to win, it’s become very clear, very quickly this season that it helps a whole lot to have two closers like Doncic and Irving on the same team when crunch time rolls around. With a win tonight, the Mavericks would also sweep their opponent (the Timberwolves) in their conference finals.
THEY SAID THAT LUKA DONCIC & KYRIE IRVING WON’T WORK TOGETHER
THEY ARE 1 WIN AWAY FROM THE NBA FINALS pic.twitter.com/pqESPogbTY
— Dallas Nation (@TheDallasNation) May 27, 2024
Across the board, at least in the conference finals, it has been complete domination. Sports fans don’t usually mind seeing that, but there are a lot of basketball watchers that would like to see close games and close series. Though people might be torn on that, one thing they can come together on is the fact that a eight-day-gap between the culmination of the conference finals and the beginning of the NBA Finals is too damn long.
If the Mavericks take care of business tonight, NBA fans will have to wait over a week for championship basketball to resume:
The NBA Finals will start on June 6, no matter how early the ECF or WCF end. There is no move-up date.
Just putting this out there because people keep asking.
— Keith Smith (@KeithSmithNBA) May 26, 2024
Like Keith Smith said, there’s no world where the NBA Finals gets moved up because of how quickly the conference finals wrapped up. An eight day break would beat the previous record of a seven-day-gap by one day, when the Golden State Warriors and Cleveland Cavaliers both blew through their competition in the Western and Eastern Conference finals in 2015.
So tonight, if you tune in to watch the game, you’ll either be rooting for over a week without basketball (thus making history), or cheering on the possibility of non-sweep and smaller wait time between series. Take your pick…
