NBA Power Rankings V2: The Jazz Take Over the Top Spot

We have a new No. 1 in the season’s second edition of our power rankings and that shouldn’t surprise anybody.

The Jazz has been playing incredible basketball, and while we all know the Lakers remain heavy favorites to repeat as world champions for all the obvious reasons, Utah is clearly the NBA’s top squad at the moment. Seriously, it ain’t even a debate.

Utah has the NBA’s best record, has only lost two games in a row once this season, and features the league’s top average margin of victory (9.30). They’re doing it with defense, they’re doing it by hitting a ton of their shots from beyond the arc, and they’re doing it by being incredibly unselfish.

“It’s like passing money around at a casino,” Jazz forward Georges Niang said after Utah’s win over Miami, talking about the team’s ball movement. “Everybody gets a little piece.”

Quick note regarding these power rankings: If you’re unfamiliar with net rating, know that it’s a team’s average point differential, or more specifically the difference between a team’s offensive rating per 100 possessions compared to its defensive rating per 100 possessions. We’re featuring it because NBA champions almost always end up owning a top 5 net rating—team’s that barely score more points than they allow usually do not end up having deep playoff runs. So it’s kind of noteworthy/important.

We’ll be updating the rankings every other week, so there are no massive knee jerk reactions to a few bad games. After Valentine’s Day, here’s where we stand:

Glad Karl-Anthony Towns is back on the court after a rough battle with COVID-19. We all know Towns and his family have been devastated by the disease. As for the Timberwolves, Minnesota owns the worst record in the league. That’s good enough for us to place the Wolves last in the rankings.

The Pistons have played a lot of close games, in part because many of the NBA’s better teams don’t take them all that seriously. Detroit’s just 3-12 in clutch games this season, defined as games with a five-point differential and under five minutes to go, and obviously one of the NBA’s worst squads despite a random win or two over some of the elites.

Washington gets a bump for wins over the Heat, Bulls, and Celtics the past two weeks. While the Wizards remain a mess props are due to Bradley Beal for continuing to light it up. The Wizards star guard now has a league-leading 16 30-plus point performances. Beal has been good for at least 25 a night in all but two of the 22 games he’s played in.

Worst net rating in the league and losers of nine of their last 11 games, the Cavs are cratering as their defensive numbers—remember, they were so impressive to start the season—have completely reversed.

Just 2-8 over its last 10 games, the Magic only had eight players available in Sunday’s loss to the Suns. They are battered and bruised unlike any squad in the NBA right now. “Everybody is kind of doing something different, playing outside our comfort zone,” Magic guard Terrence Ross said after the loss.

OKC took the Lakers to overtime in back-to-back games, nearly knocked off the Nuggets in Denver, and earned an impressive win over the Bucks at home Sunday. For such a “good” week we’ll give them a slight bump. If you can name more than three Thunder players right now, you’re better than 99 percent of NBA fans out there.

We’re all for Zach LaVine making the East All-Star squad since his numbers are eye-popping (28.1 PPG, 43.0 3FG%, 61.1 eFG%). He’s been fantastic for Chicago, enjoying a career-year. But the Bulls’ record could easily be held against him since he isn’t going to be voted in by the fans (he was fifth among guards in the East when the NBA released updated counts last week).

After ripping off six-straight wins that made us start seriously paying attention to the new-look Rockets and show them some legit respect, Houston ain’t feeling too hot these days having lost six of its last seven games. The Rockets are 0-5 this season when being held below 100 points and clearly could use the scoring prowess of Victor Oladipo who remains out indefinitely. John Wall returns to Washington Monday to face his former squad.

A recent four-game winning streak that saw New Orleans beat the likes of Phoenix, Indiana, Memphis, and Houston was followed by a three-game slide with losses to the Bulls, Mavericks, and Pistons. The Pelicans’ defense was non-existent against Dallas and Detroit.

Atlanta has lost six of its last seven games, hence the precipitous drop from the last set of rankings. Your interesting or useless Hawks stat of the week, depending on your personal preferences: According to ESPN, Atlanta is just 3-24 when Trae Young does not make a 3-pointer during his brief career. Young didn’t even attempt one on Saturday night against the Pacers, Atlanta’s third straight loss.

It’s been a bit of a mixed bag for Memphis the past two weeks. A four-game slide was stopped against the Hornets. Then came a loss to the Lakers that saw the Grizzlies blow an early 20-point lead. That was followed by a win over the Kings. Never stop trying to posterize the entire league, Ja Morant.

Some of Toronto’s advanced metrics, like its offensive rating (8th best in the league at 114.81) make them look a lot better than their record indicates. Zero excuses for losing to the Timberwolves Sunday when Minnesota didn’t even have the services of D’Angelo Russell.

Just when we were ready to start showing the Kings some serious respect, they followed up a four-game winning streak (victories over Pelicans, Celtics, Nuggets, and Clippers) with a three-game slide (losses to 76ers, Magic, and Grizzlies).

Miami’s four-game winning struck was abruptly halted by the spanking Utah handed the Heat Saturday. But there’s no shame in getting run by the Jazz in Salt Lake City. Jimmy Butler’s back, pulling off Academy Award-caliber performances the refs are falling for, and helping stabilize the Heat who still have plenty of injury issues (Goran Dragic, Avery Bradley) holding them back from being the Heat team many expected.

Julius Randle, like LaVine, is having a helluva season. And probably deserves an All-Star nod. He’s filling up the stat sheet every night, averaging career highs in PPG, RPG, APG, 3FG%, and eFG%. He’s been New York’s steadiest player as the Knicks surprisingly are in the Eastern Conference playoff hunt (7th entering Monday’s action). Don’t know if Randle will get an invite because he has plenty of competition at forward in the East, but is the Knicks keep hovering around .500 it might be hard for the coaches to not make him a reserve.

Charlotte’s good, albeit inconsistent, and a lot of fun to watch. LaMelo Ball is officially the Rookie of the Year frontrunner while praise is due Terry Rozier’s way. The guard is averaging 36 a night over his last three contests while shooting a blistering 59 percent.

Dallas is undoubtedly playing better since our last set of rankings. They just had a four-game winning streak snapped Sunday by the Blazers. But the Mavericks’ defensive issues—allowing way too points, 28th in rebounding—probably aren’t going to be fixed anytime soon so they better keep hitting those threes at a higher clip like we’ve seen the past two weeks.

If the Celtics didn’t feature a bunch of All-Stars, one of the best coaches in the league, and a massive trade exception at their disposal, you might be more than a little worried about their depth issues, Kemba Walker’s poor shooting, and 5-10 record over the last 15 games. But it’s still early, right?

Golden State behaved like the .500 club it is the past two weeks—win a few, lose a few. I’m pretty sure I don’t have to remind you how ridiculous Steph Curry has been so far this season (29.9 PPG, second behind Beal in the league, and shooting 49.3 percent from the field).

Indiana is just 4-6 over its last 10 games, but currently sits in fourth place in the East. The Pacers will continue to do enough to remain a middle-of-the-pack team in the conference without garnering any attention.

San Antonio has won five of its last six contests and owns an ultra-impressive 9-3 mark on the road. Only the Clippers, Lakers, and Jazz have more road wins among Western Conference teams than the Spurs.

Another good win for the Blazers Sunday down in Dallas for a team that’s looking a lot steadier over recent weeks despite being without CJ McCollum and Jusuf Nurkić. Portland has won six of its last seven games thanks in large part to Damian Lillard consistently delivering during Dame Time. If you don’t know now you know the Blazers currently sit in fifth place in the West.

Denver’s about to head east for a four-game road trip and the Nuggets have basically been treading water the last two weeks. We saw them earn a good win Sunday night against the Lakers at home—the Nuggets’ third straight victory. But before that three-game run, Denver had lost three in a row.

The Bucks are kind of weird this year. That sluggish start to the season appears to be behind them. But after ripping off a five-game winning streak, they followed that up last last week with a three-game slide that includes Sunday’s egregious loss to the Thunder in Oklahoma City. It continues to be a bit of a work in progress for Milwaukee, owner of the second-best net rating in the league entering Monday’s action, but this team has looked much better the past two weeks and really coach Mike Budenholzer is just using the regular-season to experiment for the postseason anyway.

The scorching hot Suns have ripped off nine wins over the past 10 games, taking full advantage of a seven-game homestand that saw them hand Ls to the Celtics, Bucks, and Sixers. Phoenix hosts Brooklyn Tuesday and that should be a fun one with Devin Booker absolutely lighting up opponents (32.2 PPG over his last four contests). O/U for Booker points scored against Brooklyn should be set at 40.5.

The Sixers finish up a tough four-game Western swing against the Jazz Monday in Utah and enter with a two-game losing streak. Can’t penalize Philly too, too much since it still owns the best overall and home record in the Eastern Conference and those back-to-back losses came against the Blazers and red-hot Suns. Joel Embiid, a top 3 MVP candidate, has scored at least 25 in 11 straight games—only Wilt Chamberlain, Charles Barkley, and Allen Iverson have pulled off a similar streak in Sixers history.

When Brooklyn’s super trio actually suits up together, which has only happened seven times for a variety of reasons since the Nets acquired James Harden in January, they look like the team to beat in the East. We’ll cool it harping on the defensive deficiencies for the moment since KD, Kyrie, and the Beard are playing beautiful basketball—Brooklyn entered the weekend second in the NBA in points per game (121.4) and third in offensive rating (116.5). They just need to stop playing down to their competitions since they’ve accumulated too many losses against terrible teams. And let’s hope Kevin Durant (out the next two games because of a hamstring injury) returns to action Thursday for that showdown against the Lakers on TNT.

The Clippers still own the NBA’s top offensive rating (119.80, slightly ahead of the Bucks) and have won 14 of their last 18. Maintenance issues with Kawhi Leonard and Paul George have caused LA’s dynamic duo to miss some games recently, but the Clippers keep rolling and remain regular-season elite.

The Nuggets ended LA’s seven-game win streak Sunday night, but that’s not a big deal. And not the reason they were dropped. What is a big deal is the Achilles issue Anthony Davis is dealing with right now. The health/prognosis of the All-NBA forward is arguably the biggest storyline in the league right now. The reason we dropped the Lakers from the top spot is that seven-game win streak featured a couple of OT wins over the Thunder and the new No. 1 has been way too impressive not to give them the nod.

Owner of the best record in the league and winners of 18 of their last 19 games, only a hater wouldn’t have Utah atop their power rankings right now. Rudy Gobert deserves more MVP love, the Jazz continue to lead the league in 3-pointers made per game (16.7), and they’ve been doing it the past four games without the services of Mike Conley who’s nursing a bum hamstring. Here’s your stupefying Jazz stat of the week: According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Utah is the third team in NBA history with 16 double-digit wins over a 19-game span.