The Boston Celtics, winners of 14 of their last 17 games, have shimmied within 2.5 games of Eastern Conference-leading Detroit Pistons with more than a month remaining in the regular season.
The lingering question: Can the Celtics make a play at the top spot in the East? And, maybe more importantly, should they want to?
Boston stands at 43-21 with 18 games remaining, while Detroit is at 45-18 after losing its fourth straight in Miami on Sunday. The Celtics would have to finish ahead of Detroit in the final standings after the Pistons won three of the four regular-season matchups to earn the head-to-head tiebreaker.
Stil, getting ahead of the Pistons won’t be an easy task.
Basketball Reference runs 10,000 daily simulations to produce their Playoff Probabilities Report. Monday’s simulations give the Celtics just a 5.6 percent chance of leapfrogging Detroit.
The big thing here is strength of schedule. Despite their stumbles, the Pistons are about to enter a soft part of their schedule. In fact, Detroit has the seventh-easiest schedule in the NBA the rest of the way with a combined opponent winning percentage of .476. Four of Detroit’s next six games are against lottery-bound teams (Brooklyn, Memphis and a double dip with Washington).
The Celtics, meanwhile, have the third-toughest remaining strength of schedule (opponents’ winning percentage at .539). That includes two road games this week against the two teams with the NBA’s best records in Oklahoma City and San Antonio. What’s more, a second game with the defending champion Thunder looms later this month, and the Celtics still have one more game each against the Knicks and Timberwolves, too.
Which is to suggest that, if Detroit can simply steady itself a bit moving forward, the Celtics are going to be hard-pressed to make a true push. The bigger concern might simply be trying to hold onto the No. 2 seed, which would ensure home court if Boston made it to Round 2 of the postseason.
“Boston is obviously a good team, but we’re not concerned about Boston,” Pistons coach J.B. Bickerstaff told reporters on Sunday. “Our biggest concern is making sure that we’re doing what we need to do to go out and be as good as we possibly can. We’ve got plenty of time to figure it out and we will.”
The one other wild card for the East’s top seeds is the play-in tournament. The Charlotte Hornets have been one of the league’s hottest teams, at least before a little stumble of their own after a big win in Boston last week.
There’s still a lot of volatility in the East play-in standings, but if the Hornets are not able to shimmy up to the No. 7 or No. 8 spot, they’d be out of play to earn the seventh seed in the play-in tournament (and play the No. 2 seed). The No. 1 seed would still be vulnerable to a Charlotte matchup if the Hornets were to land the No. 8 spot by emerging from the 9-10 bracket.
Boston’s bigger concern over its final 18 games should be the reintegration of Jayson Tatum and helping the All-NBA forward get comfortable again after missing nine-plus months while rehabbing from Achilles surgery. Early returns have been encouraging, but there’s still chemistry to rebuild on the court.
Surging to the No. 1 seed might help the cases for some of Boston’s award-eligible players and staff. Jaylen Brown’s MVP candidacy and Joe Mazzulla’s case for Coach of the Year would be strengthened by getting ahead of the Pistons. Alas, Mazzulla would be the first to balk at the mere mention of awards — at least his own — and will keep the focus on the games.
It will be interesting to take inventory on the East standings as the calendar flips to April. The Celtics play seven games in 13 days to wrap up the regular season and the standings could dictate just how hard they push to the finish line.