Pointing out: I am a diehard Bulls fan, so whenever I say things like "we", I'm talking about the Bulls. Sorry if I sound a little crazy or obsessed, I really mean it when I say I'm a diehard... anyways...
This is pretty crazy. As you may know the Bulls are now only one game behind the Spurs for best record in the league. I have always assumed that we would face the Lakers in a Finals matchup, so I've been closely following their games and in the midst of their four game losing streak we can now say we have clinched homecourt advantage in the playoffs against EVERY TEAM IN THE NBA... except the Spurs.
So I looked into our chances of catching the Spurs. In our 3 games left, we play the Howard-less Magic, the Knicks in NY, and the Nets at home. The only challenge there should be the Knicks, but even they have been struggling down the stretch and we SHOULD win out. The Spurs on the other hand have to play IN LA against the Lakers as part of back to back road games followed by a game in Phoenix. They should lose to the Lakers and could possibly drop both of those games.
IMO, the most likely scenario is that we end the season with the same record as the Spurs. The obvious tiebreaker then would be the season head-to-head matchup, which was tied at 1-1. Then I looked up tiebreakers after that... this is where it gets interesting. The second tiebreaker is record against the OPPOSING conference. The Bulls just beat the T-wolves and Suns to finish at 23-7 vs the West. With the Spurs loss to Boston at the end of March (thank god), they also finished 23-7. So... what is the third tiebreaker!?!?!?!
......A RANDOM DRAWING!!!!
How insane would that be if we played the Spurs in the Finals and homecourt (and essentially the series since both teams are almost unbeatable at home) came down to chance. I guess we would have a slight edge because the NBA is rigged in favor of larger markets (aka how we got Rose with an implied 1.7% chance), but that would be the sickest scenario ever. Another reason the homecourt would be so key is because unlike the first three rounds which is 2-2-1-1-1 format, the Finals are 2-3-2 format which is much more important. The team with homecourt has won 20/26 Finals that were played under the 2-3-2 format. Wow.
BULLieve!!!!
This is pretty crazy. As you may know the Bulls are now only one game behind the Spurs for best record in the league. I have always assumed that we would face the Lakers in a Finals matchup, so I've been closely following their games and in the midst of their four game losing streak we can now say we have clinched homecourt advantage in the playoffs against EVERY TEAM IN THE NBA... except the Spurs.
So I looked into our chances of catching the Spurs. In our 3 games left, we play the Howard-less Magic, the Knicks in NY, and the Nets at home. The only challenge there should be the Knicks, but even they have been struggling down the stretch and we SHOULD win out. The Spurs on the other hand have to play IN LA against the Lakers as part of back to back road games followed by a game in Phoenix. They should lose to the Lakers and could possibly drop both of those games.
IMO, the most likely scenario is that we end the season with the same record as the Spurs. The obvious tiebreaker then would be the season head-to-head matchup, which was tied at 1-1. Then I looked up tiebreakers after that... this is where it gets interesting. The second tiebreaker is record against the OPPOSING conference. The Bulls just beat the T-wolves and Suns to finish at 23-7 vs the West. With the Spurs loss to Boston at the end of March (thank god), they also finished 23-7. So... what is the third tiebreaker!?!?!?!
......A RANDOM DRAWING!!!!
How insane would that be if we played the Spurs in the Finals and homecourt (and essentially the series since both teams are almost unbeatable at home) came down to chance. I guess we would have a slight edge because the NBA is rigged in favor of larger markets (aka how we got Rose with an implied 1.7% chance), but that would be the sickest scenario ever. Another reason the homecourt would be so key is because unlike the first three rounds which is 2-2-1-1-1 format, the Finals are 2-3-2 format which is much more important. The team with homecourt has won 20/26 Finals that were played under the 2-3-2 format. Wow.
BULLieve!!!!
