There is just one day left in the NBA regular season, and with the playoffs less than a week away, there’s plenty to be decided in Sunday’s finale slate. While all 10 Eastern Conference playoff/play-in seeds are set, the attention now shifts out West. There are no games on Saturday as the playoff seeding for the Nuggets, Clippers, Warriors, Timberwolves and Grizzlies will be decided on Sunday.
There are many possibilities for playoff positioning in the West, so here’s a — hopefully — digestible way to understand what’s at stake during the final weekend of the NBA season.
Lakers, Knicks lock up the third seed
This was the easiest thing to understand. The Lakers won Friday and are locked in at the No. 3 seed in the West. The Knicks lost to the top-seeded Cavaliers, but the Pacers‘ loss to the Magic and the Bucks‘ win over the Pistons on Friday night secured New York the No. 3 seed in the East.
2025 NBA playoff picture: Lakers clinch No. 3 seed, Warriors-Clippers face pivotal finale, East matchups set
Brad Botkin
The Knicks will face the No. 6 Pistons in the first round of the playoffs, while the Lakers will wait to see what happens Sunday before they know their first-round opponent. If the postseason started today, Los Angeles would host a highly anticipated series opener against the Warriors.
The mess in the West
The Lakers clinched the No. 3 seed with their blowout win over the Rockets on Friday. The West’s top three seeds are now locked at the Thunder, Rockets and Lakers — in that order. After that, teams sitting fourth through eighth have yet to secure a playoff berth, and even more than that, only two games separate all those teams in the standings.
With the Warriors and Clippers each winning their game on Friday, pay particular attention to their head-to-head finale at 3:30 ET on Sunday. It will help determine a lot in terms of how these West seeds shake out and could create absolute mayhem in the standings.
The Nuggets can finish as high as fourth if they win Sunday’s finale at Houston. But the Clippers, Warriors, Grizzlies and Timberwolves can also fall anywhere between fourth and eighth. To make it even more dramatic, the Clippers and Warriors face off on Sunday, which could create absolute mayhem in the standings, depending on the outcome of that game. All those teams will be competing at a high level to get the best position possible entering the playoffs.
Bucks, Pistons matchups decide fifth seed in East
How’s this for drama? The Bucks held a one-game advantage over the Pistons for the No. 5 spot in the Eastern Conference heading into the weekend. Milwaukee just needed to win one of its last two games — which it did Friday — to secure the fifth seed. Sounds easy, right? Except the Bucks also play the Pistons on Sunday and if Detroit had won both games, they would have taken the No. 5 spot from the Bucks.
Instead, the Bucks have won seven straight and now hold a 3-0 series advantage against Detroit this season.
But a lot was at stake for both teams here. The difference between finishing sixth and fifth is a matchup against the Knicks or Pacers in the first round. Both teams would surely prefer Indiana in that scenario, especially Milwaukee, which is still without All-Star guard Damian Lillard, who has been out indefinitely with a blood clot. The Bucks are now locked in at fifth, which also avoids a second-round matchup against the defending champion Boston Celtics, which everyone would love to do.
Hawks, Bulls lock in play-in spots
It was far less exciting, but the Hawks and Bulls still had something to play for, too. Atlanta needed just one win this weekend to lock itself into the No. 8 play-in spot in the East and secured it Friday against the tanking 76ers. That sets up a potential play-in preview meeting against the Orlando Magic to close out the regular season.
Chicago did not control its own destiny to jump the Hawks, but it did win Friday. That victory secured the No. 9 spot, so the Bulls will now host a play-in game against a Heat team they just beat on April 9. That sounds like a far better matchup than going on the road to play No. 7 Orlando.
Kings can still clinch No. 9 spot with a win
Further down the West standings are the Kings and Mavericks, two disappointing teams who made two surprising trades at the deadline. Sacramento sent De’Aaron Fox to the Spurs and Dallas traded Luka Doncic to the Lakers. Those trades are not similar at all, and the Mavericks will regret that deal until the end of time, but both teams have spiraled since trading two franchise centerpieces. This weekend, they’ll both be trying to fight for the right to host a play-in game. What a far fall for the Mavericks, who were in the NBA Finals last June.
Sacramento, which fell 101-100 to the Clippers on Friday, can lock up the ninth spot by winning its final game Sunday at the Suns. Dallas would jump the Kings if Sacramento loses Sunday and the Mavericks win at the Grizzlies. In all likelihood, the Kings will host the 9/10 game, and from there, who knows the outcome of that matchup? Both teams are playing some pretty dispiriting basketball as of late, as both franchises are just waiting for the summer to come around so they can fade into obscurity until next season starts.
