Top 8 Storylines Heading into Sunday's 1st-Round 2015 NBA Playoff Matchups
The power of the NBA playoffs is overwhelming.
It cements legacies. It defines reputations. It separates good teams from great ones and scripts some of the finest stories in the game's history books.
It won't do all of those things when eight teams begin their postseason journey Sunday. But it will provide an early glimpse into the most intriguing storylines surrounding these squads and these matchups.
And plenty of notable narratives are at play.
How will the first-time playoff participants handle the pressure this stage creates? How are two of the league's top teams already waging war? Are the Atlanta Hawks ready for their new life as the Eastern Conference's hunted?
Those are just a few of the questions that will be answered over the coming weeks. And we've compiled the most important ones here and laid them out by level of significance. Star power, championship implications and historical angles all helped bring the biggest storylines to light.
8. Boston's Rapid Rebuild
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Weren't the Boston Celtics supposed to be tanking rebuilding? If that was the actual plan, they should have never hired 38-year-old coaching wunderkind Brad Stevens.
His mastery of all things X's and O's is already the stuff of legends. San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich—a five-time NBA champ who's overseen 16 consecutive 50-win seasons—admitted he's "stolen from [Stevens] plenty," per Adam Himmelsbach of The Boston Globe.
It's probably worth noting that only three seasons back, Stevens was leading the mid-major Butler Bulldogs to their fifth NCAA tournament in six years. Having Pop steal from him now is like Miguel Cabrera mimicking the hitting motions of a recent MLB call-up.
Stevens is the real deal. The Celtics probably aren't—you might not want any of their players in fantasy hoops—but he has them believing that they could be.
"He's a great basketball mind. When he draws up a play you know it's going to work because he's done it so many times," Celtics center Tyler Zeller said, via CBS Boston. "... When you have that kind of basketball mind and knowledge we really stand behind him, because we know everything he says is going to work."
Boston didn't have a single player average 20 points, eight rebounds or six assists. But it did rack up 24 victories over its final 36 games.
If the Celtics weren't likely to serve as the Cleveland Cavaliers' first-round sacrificial lamb, their remarkable turnaround would check in even higher here.
7. The Battle of the Walking Wounded
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Just a few months back, you wouldn't have looked too crazy for slotting either the Portland Trail Blazers or Memphis Grizzlies—or both—in the Western Conference Finals. But placing that expectation on those teams now might get you committed.
Neither side was able to carry over its first-half success to the stretch run. The Grizzlies went an unimpressive 16-13 after the All-Star break. The Blazers posted an unsettling 10 victories against 12 defeats after losing Wesley Matthews' potent three-and-D game and invaluable emotional leadership to his season-ending torn Achilles.
Unfortunately, that's far from the only injury concern in this matchup.
"Nicolas Batum is dealing with a right knee contusion, C.J. McCollum an ankle sprain and Arron Afflalo a shoulder sprain," wrote CBS Sports' James Herbert. "At the same time, Memphis is worried about [Mike] Conley's foot sprain, Tony Allen's hamstring injury and Courtney Lee's hand. Oh, and Marc Gasol has been playing through an ankle sprain, too."
So, to the healthy go the spoils, then? If either team comes close to qualifying as such, then quite possibly yes.
But this series is more likely to be decided by which undermanned squad can reverse its troubling trend. The Grizzlies fell from 11th in offensive efficiency before the All-Star break to 22nd after it. The Blazers had the league's third-best defense with Matthews, but they plummeted to 24th without him.
This first-round series lost a considerable amount of luster to the injury bug, but these teams' contrasting strengths and weaknesses still set the stage for a good fight.
6. The Wildest West Yet?
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This should not be possible.
When the San Antonio Spurs and Los Angeles Clippers square off Sunday, it will kick off a conference championship-caliber series...in the middle of April.
"There's a case that these are two of the NBA's three best teams," wrote ESPN Insider Kevin Pelton. "The Clippers and Spurs finished second and third in the league in point differential, respectively."
One of them won't be around for the conference semis. Good luck making sense of that.
The West, obviously, is Grand Canyon-deep. Or, it was for most of the season before injuries thinned the field. By that time, the damage had already been done. San Antonio's 55 wins couldn't command better than the No. 6 seed.
That's why we're on the verge of an unseasonable bloodbath. Not only are these teams talented, but they're also as hot as ghost peppers. L.A. closed the campaign with 14 wins over its last 15 games. San Antonio went a blistering 21-4 down the stretch.
This is Goliath vs. Goliath.
"The Clippers and Spurs will face a tougher test in the first round, by point differential, than any Eastern Conference team will face until it reaches the Finals," wrote Sports Illustrated's Ben Golliver.
The West is insane. Ditto for the playoff format that produced this opening-round prizefight.
5. Inexperienced Cavs' Baptism by Fire
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Playoff newcomer Kyrie Irving could swear he felt postseason intensity in October. He's finally about to get his first taste of the real thing.
Uncle Drew is one of many playoff virgins on the Cleveland Cavaliers. This is also new to Kevin Love, Tristan Thompson and rookie head coach David Blatt.
They might have an intimate knowledge of the sport, but the second season is a different kind of beast. It's only natural to wonder how Irving and Love will respond once the curtain rises for their debut on this stage.
"None of us know," LeBron James said, per Northeast Ohio Media Group's Joe Vardon. "The game is played on Sunday, but I think they're ready for it."
So far, Irving has exceeded expectations. He's scoring about as often as he did before James' return, shooting more efficiently and defending at a level that grades closer to serviceable than ever before.
Things haven't been nearly as easy for Love. His stat sheet has lost both quality and quantity. He's battled some nagging back problems and questioned his offensive role. He's winning for the first time in his pro career, but it's been a while since he had this little impact on his team's success.
Blatt's influence has been harder to read. Cleveland's offense can turn into a series of isolations for James and Irving, which partly explains Love's relative struggles. This should be a good test of Blatt's control—getting Love going would give the Cavs' title hopes a substantial boost—and a rather comfortable one considering Cleveland should control this series.
4. A Top-Seeded Sleeper
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The Atlanta Hawks had their doubters during their eye-opening 19-game winning streak from late December through January.
Closing the campaign with a 7-8 record over their final 15 contests didn't exactly quiet those critics.
"If the Hawks want to be the Spurs of the East, they will need to play their best basketball in April, May and June, not December, January and February," wrote Benjamin Hoffman of The New York Times.
That's certainly true, although it points more to what we don't know about Atlanta than what we do.
The Hawks clipped their own wings down the stretch. Coach Mike Budenholzer, a Popovich disciple, imitated his mentor by routinely resting his players once his club captured the East's No. 1 seed. When Bud brought his top guns, the Hawks played like the wrecking ball their 60-22 record says they are.
Starters Jeff Teague, Kyle Korver, DeMarre Carroll, Paul Millsap and Al Horford—collectively the co-Eastern Conference Players of the Month in January—consistently crushed their competition. That lineup posted a plus-8.1 net efficiency rating in its 915 minutes together, a higher mark than 29 teams put up this season.
Fans and analysts will continue to wonder aloud whether a team without a "superstar" can survive this time of year. Running roughshod over the underwhelming Brooklyn Nets won't change that tune.
"No matter what we do, there's probably going to be people who don't believe in us," Korver said, per Paul Newberry of The Associated Press.
The Hawks have been flying atop the East for nearly the entire season. Letting them sneak below the radar could be dangerous.
3. CP3's Ticking Championship Clock
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Chris Paul had a magical season, but it hasn't impacted his legacy one bit.
Most players never reach the numbers Paul just hit: 19.1 points on 48.5 percent shooting and 10.2 assists against just 2.3 turnovers. For those fortunate enough to approach that production, they dub such an outburst a "career year."
But Paul is past the point of validating his greatness on the stat sheet. Fans expect this kind of dominance.
They're just waiting for him to exorcise his playoff demons. They're more than ready for the 29-year-old to guide his club past the second round for the first time in his career.
He's ready to see that too.
"I think about our goal every moment of the day. I think about what it means," Paul told Chris Palmer for Bleacher Report. "I know there's a window for us. Believe me, I know. There's nothing I want more than that ring."
It won't take long for Paul to figure out how close—or how far—that jewelry is. The Clippers have the ultimate measuring stick in the defending champion Spurs. If L.A. passes this test, it may not face a tougher one the rest of the way.
But if the Clippers fall short, it's hard to tell what would happen next. They don't have the cap space to greatly upgrade their roster, and they'll have to shell out serious change to keep unrestricted-free-agent-to-be DeAndre Jordan.
For Paul, it would be yet another opportunity lost. And time only knows how many he has left.
2. Spurs Aiming for First Title Defense
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The Spurs are basketball's model of consistency, a machine that systematically spits out similar results year after year.
But the Alamo City would like to shed one of those constants. This reigning champ doesn't want to meet the same fate as San Antonio's other four squads did.
The Spurs have never won back-to-back titles. Two of their title defense bids ended in the conference semis. One fell apart in the opening round. Their longest run took them to the 2008 Western Conference Finals, where the Los Angeles Lakers unceremoniously eliminated them in five games.
For everything San Antonio has done well, it has never scratched its repeat itch. The Spurs are hoping this chance to make history is what will carry them to the crown.
"That's the motivation to go back-to-back," Tony Parker said, per Project Spurs' Jeff Garcia. "You know we never did it. ... Right now we have another opportunity to try to get it done, and it starts against the Clippers."
San Antonio's decorated quartet of Parker, Popovich, Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili will all have a major say in this team's success. But reigning Finals MVP Kawhi Leonard has grabbed control of this franchise with his massive mitts and the two-way miracles they regularly work.
An eye infection and lingering hand injury slowed Leonard's start, but he finished this season in a fury. He averaged 17.9 points on 52.1 percent shooting, 6.8 rebounds and 2.6 steals after the All-Star break. For context, only two players have ever put up those numbers over a full season: Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson.
Leonard is emerging as San Antonio's offensive leader, and he'll likely see some time as the team's defensive answer to Chris Paul in this series. The Spurs hope their rising star can unravel the secrets of defending the NBA throne.
1. King James Holds Decades of Cleveland's Hopes
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Some things never change.
The biggest story Sunday is the same one that's ruled the basketball world since last summer. Everyone is watching to see whether LeBron James can snap Cleveland's 50-year championship drought.
The four-time MVP has considerably more help than he did during his first tenure with the Cavs. But this team's title hopes still rest on his broad shoulders. Cleveland lost 10 of the 13 games he missed and experienced a swing of 16.7 points per 100 possessions based on whether he was on the floor.
"He's just able to burn you so many different ways," Celtics coach Brad Stevens said, per ESPN.com's Chris Forsberg. "The best player in the game. I don't know if there's anything more to say."
The Cavs don't need video game scoring numbers from James. Irving is one of the league's top scorers, Love has ranked near the top before, and Cleveland has some incendiary shooters.
But James will be the string that ties all those parts together. He missed 13 games and still tossed out 122 more assists than Cleveland's next-best distributor (511 to Irving's 389).
The Cavs will also need James to dominate defensively if they want to make a championship banner-raising run. The midseason acquisition of Timofey Mozgov strengthened Cleveland's interior, but this perimeter still has cracks, and Love has been a turnstile throughout his career. Boston is light on offensive weapons, but Cleveland will face some high-powered attacks down the line.
James, a two-time champ, knows what it takes to survive on this stage. His ability to set the tone for his untested squad could determine how this entire 16-team race shakes out.
Unless otherwise noted, statistics used courtesy of NBA.com.
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