After defeating the Boston Celtics, the New York Knicks are back on track again. The team defeated its opponents one after another within a month and played a small winning streak.
Their record also allowed their dropped ranking to finally stabilize at second in the Eastern Conference.
The only team in the entire Eastern Conference that performs better than them is the Milwaukee Bucks led by coach Mike Budenholzer.
The Bucks relied on the outstanding performance of Antetokounmpo Giannis and others to help the team win all the way. Except for losing a game against the Toronto Raptors and a game that the team lost without Antetokounmpo, the Bucks lost other games. The team all won successfully.
Coincidentally, the team behind the Knicks is the Toronto Raptors. Since they traded away the team's core DeMar DeRozan in exchange for Kawhi Leonard, the team finally seems to have a new team. The change.
They were the team with the best record in the Eastern Conference last season, so with the team's lineup largely unchanged, the Raptors' record is still good.
Leonard's arrival just helped them fill in the last piece of the puzzle.
The Raptors have always been short of players who can stand up and take control of the situation at critical moments. Whether it is Lowry or DeRozan, both of them are obviously lacking in executing key shots, but Leonard is different. He can Do it.
The Philadelphia 76ers are ranked fourth in the Eastern Conference.
No matter what they have experienced this season, no matter whether the outside world's evaluation of them is reasonable or not, the 76ers' record is quite stable. The team has always maintained a state of winning more and losing less, which also gives 76ers fans a little hope. .
They failed to get past the second round last season, and they plan to give it a try this season.
They didn't have enough confidence before facing the Knicks. After defeating the Knicks, the 76ers believed from top to bottom that the time had come!
It seems that they are quite aware of the Knicks' strength.
Many fans believe that as long as the current record can be maintained, it is entirely possible for the team to successfully advance to the Eastern Conference finals, and even reaching the finals is not a problem.
To the outside world, these four teams are the most promising to reach the Eastern Conference Finals. Although the record does not represent everything, most of the time, as long as the teams do not lose their hips in the later stages, these four teams will undoubtedly be the most competitive teams in the playoffs.
In the West, the one that attracts the most attention from fans is of course the Golden State Warriors.
The Warriors, who have an All-Star starting team, are still strong. They have not lost many games since the beginning of this season. Except for the loss to the Knicks and one loss to the Houston Rockets, they have also gone well in other games. Take it.
Therefore, their record is firmly ranked first in the Western Conference, and there is no sign of being surpassed by other teams.
Behind them are the Denver Nuggets.
The reason why the Nuggets have achieved such an outstanding record is mainly due to core players such as Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray.
Their performance at the beginning of the season has been very stable. Although they always seem to fall behind when encountering strong teams, being able to reach second place in the Western Conference with so many strong teams definitely shows that they are capable.
Ranking third in the Western Conference is the Houston Rockets.
Perhaps the combination of Chris Paul and James Harden is not exciting enough, so this season they traded Carmelo Anthony.
As a typical representative of players who "want money but not championships", Anthony's career has been smooth sailing. When he first debuted, he was compared with "LeBron". As the third overall pick of the 2003 generation, Anthony also has a very high starting point.
During the Nuggets period, he was the team's well-deserved core. Later, he moved to New York and he was also the strongest core of the Knicks.
Even though Jeremy Lin performed astonishingly during the "Linsanity" period, the team management still sent Jeremy Lin away for Anthony.
In terms of skills alone, Anthony is worthy of being the "offensive kaleidoscope" of the league, and his superb skills are almost invincible.
However, in other aspects, Anthony seems not so enthusiastic about the championship.
While LeBron was willing to work together to win the championship despite being infamy, Anthony was "quietly in peace" and dominating his own three-point acre of land. Especially after suffering from injuries, Anthony seemed to be even more... Lost enterprising spirit.
After leaving the Knicks, Anthony chose to join the Oklahoma City Thunder to cooperate with Paul George and Russell Westbrook.
The combination of the three is expected by many fans, and many people believe that they have the ability to change the pattern of the Eastern Conference. However, the much-anticipated Thunder were swept out by the Utah Jazz in the first round.
Such a result is destined to make this season look like a failure.
Anthony also had to choose to leave Oklahoma City and came to Houston alone.
To some extent, Anthony missed out on his glory days. Once upon a time, he performed like a superstar. At that time, he had every opportunity to join a strong playoff-level team, or perhaps simply join forces with other stars to form a new lineup.
If he was willing to break out of his comfort zone, maybe he would have won the championship by now!
Now 34 years old, "Little Melon" finally woke up at the end of his career and finally decided to try to win a championship to make up for his regrets. However, times have changed.
Now is not the time when we just debuted, and it is not the time when we can reach the finals with just one or two big stars.
There are only three situations for today's teams: those that are completely ruined; those that try to unite but fail to do so; those that successfully unite and continue to deepen the lineup.
It’s hard to come back to the “lone hero” style of play in the past era! Even if Kobe Bryant were to start his career again in his prime, he might not be able to withstand an all-star starting lineup like the Warriors on his own!
All this is destined to prove that the championship that Anthony hopes for will be difficult to achieve!
How could he, who had once been a superstar, be willing to stoop down and become a substitute? Why are you willing to sacrifice your ball rights to sit on the bench? How could you be willing to lower your head and do things that you would never even take a look at?
Just like the original superstar Allen Iverson, his career seemed to have come to an end when he was put on the team bench while playing for the Detroit Pistons.
Veterans will only wither away if they don't die!
Even though he later went to the Memphis Grizzlies, and even briefly returned to the Philadelphia 76ers, everything changed too fast, and his era was as unstoppable as a rolling torrent, turning into waves and never returning!
