As we inch closer and closer to the start of the postseason, we try to predict how many more wins the Los Angeles Lakers need to avoid the Play-In Tournament.
Most teams around the league have anywhere between 16-19 games left in the regular season. It's only natural for many of those teams to already be looking ahead to the start of the postseason, which is a little more than a month away. For a handful of teams in the Western Conference, the goal over the next few weeks will be to try to align themselves in a way where they can avoid having to win their way into the playoffs via the Play-In Tournament.
Anything can happen in a one-game sample and it would be in the best interest of postseason-bound teams to avoid having to put themselves in such a situation. One of the teams that fall in that category is the Los Angeles Lakers. After scoring a huge win over the Minnesota Timberwolves Sunday night, the Lakers are 36-30 and are just two games out of the sixth seed in the West standings.
How the Los Angeles Lakers have played recently
Over the last month, since February 1, the Lakers are a team that has grown more consistent. Los Angeles is 12-5 since February 1 and has begun to show some real signs of potential. Heading into the final stretch run, the question is, how far can this recent improved play carry the Lakers? First things first, it may be in the best interest of the Lakers to avoid the Play-In Tournament.
With the idea of the Lakers finishing the regular season as a top 6 seed in the West standings, we explore how many wins exactly the team needs to accomplish such a goal.
What the Play-In Tournament picture looks like
Before we try to predict how many wins the Lakers will need to finish with this season in order to avoid the Play-In Tournament, let's look at what the bottom of the Western Conference standings look like at the moment. With the top 4 of the Oklahoma City Thunder, Denver Nuggets, Minnesota Timberwolves, and LA Clippers, in some order, all but locked in, there are six teams battling for the final two guaranteed playoff spots before the end of the regular season.
5. New Orleans Pelicans (37-27)
6. Phoenix Suns (36-27)
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7. Sacramento Kings (36-27)
8. Dallas Mavericks (36-28)
9. Los Angeles Lakers (36-30)
10. Golden State Warriors (33-30)
The Lakers are currently sitting as the 9th seed in the West standings but are only two games back of the sixth seed. It's also encouraging that they're only three games back (in the loss column) of the fifth seed. If they want to secure a top 6 seed, the Lakers are going to have to play some of their best basketball down the stretch.
The good news for the Lakers is that we've begun to see that from them over the last few weeks of the season. If they can continue to play at this level, there's no question the Lakers could end the season as a top 6 team in the standings and successfully avoid the Western Conference Play-In Tournament.
How many more wins do the Los Angeles Lakers need to secure a top 6 seed in the West?
Now we get to the difficult part of this exercise; how many games do the Los Angeles Lakers have to win in order to secure a top 6 seed in the Western Conference standings heading into the playoffs? That could be difficult to answer. However, for the sake of this article, we're going to attempt to get an answer.
Let's project out and assume the Suns and Pelicans are going to close the season with an above .500 record over the last handful of games they have on their schedule. A safe assumption is that they're going to win 10-12 more games considering they have 17 and 18 games remaining on their schedule.
That puts the Pelicans and Suns around the 47-48 win range; again, it could be slightly less or perhaps more if one of them gets hot. Under that assumption, that means the Lakers would be in a good position to finish as a top 6 seed if they end up with 47 wins on the season. That means the Lakers have to close the season with an 11-5 record over the last 16 games remaining on their schedule.
Considering the Lakers are 12-5 in their last 17 games, finishing 11-5 over the final few weeks of the season isn't that outlandish. The question is, can they be consistent enough down the stretch to get the job done? We shall see.