On any given night, a handful of NBA teams look dominant, but only three teams have a real claim to be the best in the league.
Entering Sunday, the Detroit Pistons have the best record in the NBA at 44-14. They lead the Oklahoma City Thunder (46-16) by half of a game and the San Antonio Spurs (43-16) by two games.
The fact that the race is this close is remarkable when you consider the start the Thunder jumped out to earlier this season. It seemed like OKC would run away with the best record when they started 24-1. Then the Spurs changed the course of the season in Las Vegas with their win against the Thunder in the NBA Cup semifinals.
Injuries have played a factor, too. The Thunder have fought valiantly to maintain their place in the standings with key members of their rotation sitting out for long stretches. The Pistons happily filled that void and have ascended over the past two months.
The margins are razor thin and with roughly 20 games left, all three teams have a legitimate shot to finish with the best regular season record.
Looking at the remaining schedule for all three teams, there are a few reasons to believe the Spurs could jump both teams in the standings.
Since that NBA Cup semifinals game against the Thunder, no team has been better than the Spurs when you look at on-court metrics. They are tied for the best point differential in the NBA with a plus-10.1 Net Rating, according to Cleaning the Glass.
The Spurs have nine games left against teams in the top six in either the Eastern or Western conference, all teams that would be guaranteed to make the playoffs if the season ended today.
One of those games is on the road Sunday against the New York Knicks, but six of those games are at home and include some of their toughest opponents: Boston Celtics, Houston Rockets and Denver Nuggets. The Spurs beat the Celtics and Nuggets on the road earlier this season and lead the season series against the Rockets.
The Thunder also have nine games against top-six teams with six home games. They still have to play the Celtics twice and have remaining games against the Nuggets, who they narrowly survived on Friday, the Pistons, who beat them in Detroit and Minnesota Timberwolves, who lead them in their season series.
The Pistons have nine games left against top-six teams, but only four of those games are at home. They have to play the most road games (14) in the NBA through the end of the regular season and they have five back-to-backs remaining, which is the second-most in the league.
The Pistons also have to play Spurs and Thunder once more on the road. The Spurs already beat the Pistons at home and the Thunder lost a close game to the Pistons Wednesday without Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams.
Betting on the NBA?
By season’s end, the Spurs could easily have the upper hand on both the Pistons and Thunder in head-to-head matchups. However, oddsmakers have them behind both the Pistons and Thunder to finish with the best record in the NBA.
The Thunder are -290 to have the best record in the regular season, with the Pistons listed at +300 and the Spurs listed at +900. Those odds translate to a 68 percent chance for the Thunder, a 23 percent chance for the Pistons and a nine percent chance for the Spurs.
That number is way too low for how good the Spurs have been. I’ll happily grab them to win the most regular season games and to have the best record post All-Star break.
The Pick: Spurs most regular season wins (+900, DraftKings) | Spurs best record after the break (+320, DraftKings)
Why Trust New York Post Betting
Malik Smith has been immersed in the sports betting industry since 2017. He’s a data nerd with a particular focus on the NBA and combat sports. He spends his weeknights in the winter looking for edges on plus-money NBA player props.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
