'%20x='0'%20y='0'%20height='100%25'%20width='100%25'%20%0A%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20%20xlink%3Ahref='data:image/jpg;base64,/9j/2wBDAAYEBQYFBAYGBQYHBwYIChAKCgkJChQODwwQFxQYGBcUFhYaHSUfGhsjHBYWICwgIyYnKSopGR8tMC0oMCUoKSj/2wBDAQcHBwoIChMKChMoGhYaKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCgoKCj/wgARCAAGAAoDASIAAhEBAxEB/8QAFQABAQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAABAf/2gAIAQEAAAAAlzf/xAAUAQEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAD/9oACAECEAAAAD//xAAUAQEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAE/9oACAEDEAAAAFf/xAAfEAACAgICAwEAAAAAAAAAAAACAwEEBRIAERMhcpL/2gAIAQEAAT8Ay78fgVNrAhxs8BtM41HXUoEIH9e55TwQWaiHkVYCaAnIjXnqO4++f//EABcRAAMBAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAADITH/2gAIAQIBAT8AZMP/xAAWEQEBAQAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACAQD/2gAIAQMBAT8ADVu//9k='%3E%3C/image%3E%3C/svg%3E)
The NBA season is about to end quite soon.
Cleveland is down 3-0 to Golden State in the NBA Finals, and teams with a 3-0 lead in the Finals have a 13-0 record thus far. Nothing we've seen in the series serves to suggest the presence of any ray of hope for the Cavaliers, and it's about time we drew curtains on the 2017-18 season and took a look back at how the season panned out for the entire league.
The regular season campaign saw the emergence of a new superteam in H-Town. The Rockets razzled and dazzled teams all along the way to usurping the #1 seed from the Warriors for the first time in 4 seasons, and they looked primed to upset them in the Conference Finals.
In the other conference, Kyrie Irving's move from Cleveland to Boston caused a seismic shift in the balance of Eastern Conference power, as the Cavaliers slid to the 4th spot in the regular season Eastern Conference standings. The Toronto Raptors emerged from the regular season with the second-best record in the league and were hyped to end LeBron's reign of terror in the Eastern Conference.
Neither of the aforementioned scenarios bore fruit, but this takes nothing away from the efforts of these teams through the 82-game regular season. Let's take a look at the most potent offensive teams through the campaign:
#5 Cleveland Cavaliers - 110.6 points per 100 possessions
The Cleveland Cavaliers were just a bad defensive team, ranking 29th out of 30 teams in the league in defensive efficiency over 82 games of the regular season. The only reason they made it to the playoffs was the fact that their offensive efficiency ranked 5th in the league.
LeBron James is responsible for the majority of the plays they made on the offensive end of the ball. He averaged 27.5 points per game, ranking 3rd in the league in scoring per game on a field goal percentage of 54.2% from the floor while converting 36.7% of his 3-pointers. He also logged 9.1 assists per game, ranking second in the league for the same behind only Russell Westbrook.
Other than LeBron, the Cavs got solid contributions on offense from the likes of Kevin Love, Jeff Green, Larry Nance Jr, Jordan Clarkson and Kyle Korver. They ranked 6th in 3-point percentage mainly due to the presence of all those sharpshooters on their roster.
#4 Minnesota Timberwolves - 110.8 points per 100 possessions
The Timberwolves managed to pull off one of the best trade heists of the summer, bagging Jimmy Butler in exchange for the 7th pick in the 2017 NBA draft (Lauri Markkanen) and Zach LaVine from a rebuilding Chicago Bulls team. Signing Butler bolstered their win total by 16, despite the fact that Jimmy G missed a ton of crucial games late in the season due to a meniscus injury.
While the Timberwolves were one of the worst defensive teams in the league, their offensive firepower just about put them over the line in a Murderer's Row of a Western Conference playoff race that concluded with a winner-takes-all game vs the Nuggets on the last day of the season.
Andrew Wiggins regressed a bit in terms of an efficiency standpoint, but he has all the tools to turn the momentum around this postseason. Karl-Anthony Towns, meanwhile, made the leap to the All-Star team as well as the 3rd team All-NBA, and is one of the most complete offensive centers to ever play the game. Things are looking good for a Timberwolves franchise that made the playoffs for the first time in 14 years.
#3 Toronto Raptors - 111.0 points per 100 possessions
The Raptors completely undid their offensive philosophy through the offseason. Instead of dumping the ball in DeRozan and Lowry's hands at every opportunity and expecting the duo to score or create for their teammates, they move to a free-flowing offense, handing the keys of the offense to their individual players to make reads and generate shots on their own.
The results during the regular season, were, for a large part, a success. The Raptors were the only team in the league to rank among the top 3 in both defensive efficiency and offensive efficiency and possessed the 3rd best net rating among all teams in the league.
The revamped offensive scheme led to drops in production from both their All-Stars, but the rest of the Raptors made solid strides to compensate for this. The Raptors have been unfortunate to run into LeBron James in the playoffs for the last 3 years, but they really did a great job as a team this year during the regular season on both ends of the floor.
#2 Houston Rockets - 112.2 points per 100 possessions
The Rockets were bolstered by one of the most lopsided trades of the summer, receiving Chris Paul in return for 8 players whose combined impact on the Clippers' fortunes was less than Paul offered alone. Having two first-ballot Hall of Famers running the offense was a huge factor in the Rockets' 65-17 record through the regular season.
James Harden and Paul ranked second and third in the league in assists handed out per 36 minutes. Often, the Rockets were able to field just one of Paul or Harden on the hardwood and still blow out teams in 4-5 minute spells of 3-point shooting fire and mazy dribbles.
Harden and Paul were the two best iso players of the season as well, combining otherworldly ball-handling skills with similar playmaking skill to average north of 1.03 points per possession each (Harden's figure of 1.21 is among the best for a player all-time through the course of a season).
Their battery of sharpshooters like Ariza, Tucker, Mbah a Moute, Eric Gordon and Ryan Anderson alongside an elite rim-runner in Clint Capela provided the perfect complementary cast for a Rockets team that lost 4-3 to the Warriors in the real NBA Finals - the Western Conference Finals.
#1 Golden State Warriors - 112.3 points per 100 possessions
Not only do the Warriors possess 4 of the best offensive players in the game today, they also have possibly the 4 most unselfish players in the league. Anyone of Klay Thompson, Kevin Durant, Stephen Curry and Draymond Green could move to another team in the league today and average monster numbers.
But under the eye-soothing offensive schemes of Steve Kerr, the fearsome foursome have sacrificed individual numbers for championships, and it has worked magnificently for them thus far.
Think about this - the Warriors' offensive system is so good that despite missing all 4 of their crucial core players for over the last 20 games of the season, they still ranked as the best offensive team in the league. Not only do they lead the league in offensive rating, they also have the best marks for assists per game, field goal percentage, 3-point percentage and free throw percentage.
The Warriors are one of the greatest teams to ever take the floor together, and instead of cursing them for ruining the competitive balance of the league, true basketball fans would be better served to watch them display extremely watchable basketball night-in and night-out on the way to putting together one of the most dominant dynasties the game has ever seen.
