Thunder Dominate NBA Cup Play--and Everything Else
The Oklahoma City Thunder lost to the Milwaukee Bucks in the 2024 NBA Cup Championship Game, but the Thunder have rolled since then, setting the NBA's single season point differential record (12.9 ppg) while going 68-14 before defeating the Indiana Pacers in the 2025 NBA Finals. The Thunder currently have a league-leading 21-1 record with an incredible 15.3 ppg point differential. Jalen Williams, the Thunder's second best player behind Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, has appeared in just three of the Thunder's 22 games, and other key Thunder players--including Lu Dort, Alex Caruso, and Aaron Wiggins--have missed significant time as well.
The Thunder seem to be well on their way to not only winning 70-plus regular season games but also becoming the first repeat champion since the 2018 Golden State Warriors--but before the NBA playoffs, the basketball gods (also known as NBA Commissioner Adam Silver) have placed the NBA Cup. The Thunder are dominating the NBA Cup even more decisively than they are dominating the regular season overall; they went 4-0 in NBA Cup group play with an 18.8 ppg point differential, finishing first in West Group A to set up a quarterfinal game versus the Phoenix Suns on December 10. The winner of that game will face the winner of the December 10 game featuring the L.A. Lakers and the San Antonio Spurs. The Lakers have the second best overall record in the Western Conference (15-5), followed by the Houston Rockets (13-5), San Antonio Spurs (14-6), and Denver Nuggets (14-6). The Suns are seventh with a 13-9 record.
The Thunder beat the Suns 123-119 on November 28 as Williams made his season debut with 11 points on 3-12 field goal shooting. The Suns have played surprisingly well this season, but Williams has looked better in each game that he has played so far and the Thunder's victory margin has increased in each of those games, so the Thunder should beat the Suns to advance to the semifinals.
Only four of the Lakers' 15 wins are against teams that currently have winning records, so it will be interesting to see how the Lakers fare against tougher competition. The Lakers beat the Spurs 118-116 on November 5, but the Lakers have given up at least 118 points in four of their past five games and I expect the Spurs to win a close, high scoring game to earn a matchup with the Thunder.
The Thunder have yet to play the Spurs this season, but if they play in the semifinals I predict that the Thunder will win by at least 10 points.
In the Eastern Conference, the Orlando Magic and Toronto Raptors each went 4-0 in NBA Cup group play but the Magic earned the top seed because they had a better NBA Cup point differential (+64 compared to +55)--and they achieved that primarily by drilling the Philadelphia 76ers 144-103 on November 25. The Detroit Pistons have the best record (17-4) in the Eastern Conference and the second best record in the league behind the Thunder, but they went 2-2 in NBA Cup group play and failed to advance to the quarterfinals. The Cleveland Cavaliers had the Eastern Conference's best record last season (64-18) but they are just 13-9 this season, including 2-2 in NBA Cup group play.
The Magic are currently fifth overall in the Eastern Conference with a 13-8 record, and they will face the Miami Heat (14-7 overall, 3-1 in NBA Cup group play) in the NBA Cup quarterfinals on December 9. Orlando beat Miami 125-121 on October 22 in the season opener for both teams. The Magic lost their next four games, but they have won their last three games and six of their last seven; the Heat have also played very well recently, winning seven of their last eight games. I expect Orlando to beat Miami in a close game to advance to the NBA Cup semifinals. The other Eastern Conference quarterfinals matchup features Toronto versus the New York Knicks (13-7 overall, 3-1 in NBA Cup group play). The 15-7 Raptors are one of the league's early season surprises, but they have feasted on a weak schedule loaded with sub-.500 teams, and they lost to the Knicks 116-94 on November 30. I predict that the Knicks will beat the Raptors by double digits.
The Magic have already beaten the Knicks twice this season (124-107 on November 12, and 133-121 on November 22), and if they face each other in the semifinals I expect the Magic to win again.
The Thunder have not played the Magic this season, but if they meet in the NBA Cup Championship Game then I expect the Thunder to win.
The NBA Cup seems to be here to stay, so anyone covering the NBA is obligated to discuss it, but I still consider it to be a flawed concept, and in 2023 I pointed out the NBA Cup's two major drawbacks:
There are at least two drawbacks with the current NBA Cup format: (1) the use of point differential as the first tiebreaker in Group Play resulted in farcical situations during which teams ran up the score, and (2) there will be quirky scheduling this week for the teams that did not qualify for knockout round play. Regarding the first drawback, I am all for players and teams playing hard from opening tip to final buzzer, but intentionally running up the score in the waning moments of a blowout looks silly and renders those individual and team statistics meaningless: how many more points would the great teams and players of the past have scored if teams ran up the score instead of putting in the reserves? Regarding the second drawback, if a fan wants to see a particular visiting player or team how is he supposed to plan in advance for a week in which the schedule is dotted with "TBD"?
The NBA has done nothing to fix either drawback, so we continue to see inflated statistics from blowout games along with a schedule that is frustrating and confounding for fans who are trying to make plans to see specific players or teams.
The long term historical significance of the NBA Cup is unclear, but thus far NBA Cup success has not yet consistently translated to NBA playoff success. The L.A. Lakers defeated the Indiana Pacers in the 2023 NBA Cup Championship Game, but the Lakers finished the season as the eighth seeded team in the Western Conference before losing 4-1 to the Denver Nuggets in the first round. The Pacers had the same record as the Lakers (47-35) but finished sixth in the weaker Eastern Conference and then advanced to the Eastern Conference Finals before being swept by the Boston Celtics, who went on to capture the NBA title. The Milwaukee Bucks finished fifth in the Eastern Conference and lost in the first round of the 2025 playoffs after winning the 2024 NBA Cup. So far, the 2024-25 Thunder are the only NBA Cup Championship Game participant that has reached the NBA Finals.
Labels: L.A. Lakers, Miami Heat, New York Knicks, Oklahoma City Thunder, Orlando Magic, Phoenix Suns, San Antonio Spurs, Toronto Raptors
posted by David Friedman @ 5:03 PM
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