The NBA Will Officially Seed Conference Playoff Teams By Regular Season Record

Chris Paul, Tim Duncan
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The Los Angeles Clippers and San Antonio Spurs played one of the most competitive and well-executed first-round playoff series in history last May. Under new league rules, though, the basketball world will likely be robbed of such sweeping excellence so early in the postseason – not that you’ll hear NBA teams complaining about the changes.

Beginning in 2015-16, playoff seeding for each conference will be determined by regular season record only, a departure from the division-based process that often pitted elite teams against one another earlier in the postseason than year-long wins and losses suggested they should be.

Below are pertinent details of the league’s press release on seeding modifications.

The NBA Board of Governors unanimously approved changes to playoff seeding and qualification procedures effective with the 2015-16 season, the league announced today.
As part of the modifications, the eight playoff teams in each conference will be seeded in order of their regular-season record…
The Board also approved changes to tiebreak criteria for playoff seeding and home-court advantage. Head-to-head results have become the first criterion to break ties for playoff seeding and home-court advantage between two teams with identical regular-season records; the second criterion is whether a team won its division.

Under the previous system, teams that won their divisions were assured a top-four seed in their respective conference regardless of their record during the regular season.

This development has been expected for many months. Commissioner Adam Silver said in mid-July that the competition committee recommended playoff seeding come down to conference record first and foremost, and only a week later reiterated the league was “leaning” toward making adjustments to reflect that advice.

Despite the incredible enjoyment gleaned from watching squads the quality of the Clippers and Spurs go head-to-head in the first-round, this is a win-win for the NBA – and its millions of fans across the globe. Not only should teams be rewarded for regular season performance by facing lesser competition early in the playoffs, but the level of play should also heighten the longer they last.

Though his team won that clash of titans, for instance, Los Angeles coach Doc Rivers was lobbying for these specific modifications regardless.

Would the Clippers have had more left in the tank against the Houston Rockets if they hadn’t played seven-game series the prior postseason round? It certainly seems a likely possibility, and the potential corollaries of that proving the case are absolutely endless. Perhaps Los Angeles might have beaten the Golden State Warriors after dispatching of Houston – the Clippers would have had home-court for Game 7 versus the Rockets – to win the West, then take down LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers for its first championship in franchise history. There’s just no way to know for sure in a league so tightly packed at the top.

But what we do know is that this change is long overdue. Next up for the NBA? Doing away with divisions entirely, hopefully setting the stage for the abolishment of conferences altogether. Baby steps.

[Via NBA, via Arash Markazi]

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