Playoff race

[Alex Wang <awang@mit.edu>]

I'm pretty pleased with the latest victory against Vancouver. When I looked
at the six game road trip before the All-Star break, I thought to myself
that 2-4 would be reasonable, given that there were four solid playoff
teams who were very strong at home. Even if we lose to the Lakers tonight,
we've survived the road trip without falling completely out of the playoff
race. After the Lakers game, we'll have 15 home games and 12 road games
remaining. All but five of the remaining games will be against conference
opponents, with two games against Milwaukee, three games against Orlando,
and two games against Detroit - our rivals for the final playoff spot.

Here are the current standings for the last two playoff spots:

                    GB    home/road left
Milwaukee   27-28   ---   14   13
Detroit     26-27   ---   15   14
-----------------------
Orlando     25-29   1.5   15   13
Boston      23-21   3.5   15   13

All these teams play tonight: 76ers at Bucks, Warriors at Pistons,
Magic at Jazz. 

So the Celtics are still very much in the playoff hunt. They need to
win games on the road, especially against their playoff rivals, and
they need either Milwaukee and Detroit to fall apart to a degree
(Milwaukee is 2-8 in their last 10 games). There don't seem to be
any unwinnable games on the March and April schedule; against the
top three teams in the East, we just have the season finale against NY
at home. Against the Western playoff teams, just Pheonix on the
road and Minnesota at home. So regardless of all that's happened
before - abortive trades, injuries, losses to subpar teams - the
Celtics need to play like we expected them to at the beginning of
the year, and they'll make the playoffs.

Alex