Playoff Predictions: Round One

Just in time for the first game (which is probably on right now), here are the Balding Spalding first playoff predictions. It's been a long year of watching basketball and it all comes down to this for a lot of teams. You've got some older teams trying to grab another one before the window closes (San Antonio, Boston, Phoenix), some young teams looking to back up their good regular seasons with some playoff success (OKC, Milwaukee) and the usual suspects back again to try at the championship (Clevland, Orlando, Dallas). After it all, you've got lots of reasons to root for each team and lots of teams who will be pushing hard to keep things alive until June.


Alright, lets keep these short and sweet. Based on some stats, some intuition and a whole lot of guesswork, I've come upon my first round predictions and hopefully they don't disappoint. Up first is the Eastern Conference, and the team with home court advantage is on the left side as we go along.

East

Clevland vs Chicago: Clevland in 4

Lebron and co. won't be taking it easy on Chicago at any point in this series. This year the talk about Lebron has usually centered around his dominating play and how he has established himself as the best player in the game, but what went relatively unnoticed is Lebron's changed demeanor. All year he has been steely in his determination, never really showing any cracks all year. While Rose will cause problems for them and Joakim Noah would rather lose his hair than this series, Lebron has had this team in win-mode all year and I won't expect any different in this series.

Orlando vs Charlotte: Orlando in 5

Charlotte has been the favored upset pick, as they have the 1st overall defensive efficiency and Orlando has the leagues 2nd best offensive efficiency. I understand the ideas behind the 'defense wins championships' mantra, but this Magic team is no chump on the defense and rebounding ballots, especially with their center about to win his second consecutive DPOY award. The Bobcats won't be able to increase their offense as much as Orlando will be able to tighten up their defense, so Charlotte will only be able to take game 3 or 4 at home before being finished off by the Magic.

Atlanta vs Milwaukee: Atlanta in 6

I feel this match-up is a lot closer than most people think, but it's still not very close in the end. If the Big Aussie was still around I might even favor this prototypical Skiles team, but without him Horford and Smith will be too much on the boards to handle. Milwaukee might be able to make things interesting by going a bit smaller and shooting on the Hawks, but Horford has shown this year that he can defend out to the 3-pt line and Smith covers too much ground to make this very effective. This long, athletic and balanced Atlanta team will tighten up in the first round but looks for trouble past this round.

Boston vs Miami: Miami in 7

Boston had one of the worst finishes of any of the playoff teams, going 3-7 over their last ten heading into the playoffs. This partly was due to Doc Rivers resting most of his starters in the last month, but I still don't feel well about the Celtics coming into these playoffs. None of the Big 3 have looked like themselves for long this year and because of this, Rondo has stepped up and become the focal piece of their team. I am an avid Rondo supporter, but he hasn't had this big of a load put on him in the playoffs before and it may not work well. The other obvious issue will be defending Wade but Boston's biggest strength is their pick-and-roll defense, so expect Haslem and Beasley to play a big role hitting 15-18 footers from the corner rather than the usual Wade attack.

West

Los Angeles vs Oklahoma City: Los Angeles in 6

The Lakers have some things to worry about in this match up, but nothing the champs can't handle. The Durantula's skinny frame is going to take a beating against Ron-Ron, and while the 2-3 days rest each game will help this, another issue arises. Oklahoma doesn't really have any outside shooters in their starting line-up past Jeff Green, which means that the Lakers will be able to effectively employ their strong-side overload defense. Durant will be played tightly by Artest all series, and the Lakers will be able to help without any repercussions from the 3-pt line. It also helps that Gasol will be defended by Ibaka and Collison most of the series.

Dallas vs San Antonio: Dallas in 7

Despite being a 2 vs 7 match-up, I think this should be the closest series in the first round (other than maybe Boston-Miami). The Spurs have been inconsistent all year, but have experience and know how to tighten up when it matters. The Mavs have been consistently excellent all year, but are known to crumble under pressure and tend to unravel with the pressure on. This series will be complicated and very well-coached, but two match-ups will swing the battle - Nowitzki vs. Duncan and Butler vs. Ginobli.

Phoenix vs Portland: Pheonix in 6

Portland had some bad news this week, Brandon Roy will be having surgery on his knee which will mean his misses at least the first two playoff games and possibly more. Phoenix has been one of the NBA's best home teams this year, posting a 32-9 record at the US Airways Center. Portland has been a good road team but the Suns will come out shooting hot and without Roy, his team will have a very tough time scoring enough to keep up. I like McMillan with regards to coaching and Camby could average 20+ boards in this series, but Portland is this and Gentry is gonna run them into the ground.

Denver vs Utah: Denver in 7

This should be an interesting series, and the one I am most excited to watch. Both of these teams mean serious business, they have been too close in the past and want to win badly for their coaches (Karl is battling throat cancer and Sloan is battling... Father Time) before their time in the NBA is up. It was announced yesterday the AK-47 will miss the series, but Kenyon Martin looked slow and ineffective in his last few games after coming back from an injury. These two should problems should end up being a wash for the two teams, but the issue will be who Utah now uses to defend Carmelo. They will most likely rotate between CJ Miles and Korver, so expect 'Melo to drop a few 40 point games.