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Monday, Jan. 13
You also are invited, as always, to rank the teams yourself here.
| 2013-14 Power Rankings: Week 11 | ||||
| RANK | TEAM / RECORD | TRENDING | COMMENTS | |
| 1 |
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Last Week: 1 | It's not just Miami. The Pacers are trying to muddle through some January blahs of their own, most notably a slumping (or at least cruising) Paul George. Indy, though, also just held its 10th opponent (Washington) under 80 points. No other team has done it more than Chicago's four times. | ||
| 2 | 1 Last Week: 3 | Before you spend any more time trying to dream up David Lee scenarios via ESPN's Trade Machine, be advised that he's averaging 22.1 PPG (on 60 percent shooting) and 9.8 RPG during the Dubs' 11-1 surge. And now they're in the midst of playing 10 of 14 games at home until the All-Star break. | ||
| 3 | 3 Last Week: 6 | Slippage on D in December, multiple injuries and their well-chronicled struggles to beat the rest of the West's elite haven't stopped the Spurs from posting the league's best road record (14-3) or giving themselves a shot to be the NBA's first 30-win team if they win Monday in New Orleans. | ||
| 4 | 2 Last Week: 2 | Injury issues. Motivation issues. Wholly unexpected FT issues for D-Wade. Micky Arison is right when he tweets that panic makes zero sense in early January -- and in a two-team conference -- but maybe the two-time champs need Tuesday's trip to the White House to get their minds right. | ||
| 5 | 1 Last Week: 4 | Blazermaniacs still down about the home loss to Philly just before last week's rankings were published and the loss at Sacramento that immediately followed are advised to drop everything and go read LaMarcus Aldridge's latest comments about wanting an extension. That'll lift your spirits. | ||
| 6 | 1 Last Week: 5 | Kevin Durant's numbers in these past nine games since Russell Westbrook's latest knee surgery are only getting more insane: 34.2 PPG, 8.6 RPG and 5.4 APG. But the Thunder are a mortal 5-4 in that stretch and certainly don't want to keep asking KD to do that much night after night. Do they? | ||
| 7 | 2 Last Week: 9 | If you're in the mood to nitpick Blake Griffin's game these days, you're going to have to look hard. He's reached the 30-point plateau five times in the Clippers' past 11 outings ... after getting there just once in the first 28. And I wouldn't think the game gets easier with CP3 in street clothes. | ||
| 8 | 2 Last Week: 10 | Not enough attention has been paid to the fact that Sacramento is a passable 8-9 since getting Rudy Gay. Or that Gay is shooting a crazy .621 from the field in January. No remorse from the Raps, though, thanks to a 12-5 mark since the trade, tying Miami for best in the East in that span. | ||
| 9 | 1 Last Week: 8 | Maybe this will be the week that the Rockets dodge an injury curveball after Chandler Parsons was unexpectedly forced to miss three games with a sore knee last week. Another problem in Houston: At a mere 13-11 against the rest of the West, they're living off an 11-2 record against the East. | ||
| 10 | 3 Last Week: 13 | Atlanta just beat Indiana and Houston back-to-back at home to move to 9-2 in its past 11 Philips Center engagements ... with the only losses coming to Golden State and OKC. Popular as it is to proclaim these guys toast after losing Al Horford, Kyle Korver and his Hawks don't seem to be listening. | ||
| 11 | 4 Last Week: 7 | Add Eric Bledsoe's name to the depressing list of top performers out right now. Just off the top of our heads, he joins Ryan Anderson, Kobe Bryant, Marc Gasol, Jrue Holiday, Al Horford, Brook Lopez, Steve Nash, Chris Paul, Rajon Rondo, Derrick Rose and Russell Westbrook. Super depressing. | ||
| 12 | 1 Last Week: 11 | Only three players in the past 25 seasons have posted a 40-point game at an older age than Dirk Nowitzki, who clocked in at 35 years and 206 days when he uncorked 40 in a narrow (and fortuitous) win over New Orleans. Michael Jordan did it at 40, Karl Malone did it at 39 and Shaq O'Neal did it at nearly 37. | ||
| 13 | 2 Last Week: 15 | Andre Miller's uncertain future has hogged all the headlines, but it's probably time to start paying attention to Ty Lawson. Those up-and-down Nuggets have followed an eight-game skid with a five-game winning streak ... with Lawson as the prime spark at 17.3 points and 11.7 assists in January. | ||
| 14 | 2 Last Week: 16 | Tom Thibodeau's Bulls held five straight foes under 90 points, stretched their home win streak to four with an ugly win over Charlotte and, thanks to the ineptitude all over the Leastern Conference, leave the impression that they intend to make the playoffs even without D-Rose or Deng. | ||
| 15 | 3 Last Week: 12 | Eight of Minnesota's 18 wins have been by 20 points or more. Yet I'm guessing you've noticed that all the talk about these guys lately has focused on the Wolves' fatal 0-10 record in games decided by five points or fewer ... and how much responsibility Kevin Love should shoulder for that mark. | ||
| 16 | 1 Last Week: 17 | The Grizz are grateful to be flirting with .500 when they last saw Marc Gasol in uniform on Nov. 22. Taking on Courtney Lee's long-term deal signaled Memphis' intent to try to sneak into the playoffs as a low seed no one wants to see ... with Gasol on track to be back in practice this week. | ||
| 17 | 3 Last Week: 14 | Don't expect the Wiz to protest too loudly about where they live. Not even after the leaks in the roof that led to multiple rain delays -- NBA rain delays! -- Saturday night. Life is still quite grand in the East when you're 1-14 against .500-or-better teams and still on course for a playoff spot. | ||
| 18 | 2 Last Week: 20 | Props to the Knicks. Amid all the J.R. Smith noise, Amar'e Stoudemire is starting to stir, Iman Shumpert and Ray Felton are finally giving them something in the backcourt and Carmelo Anthony has had a few five-assist games lately. The result is a 5-1 run ... with Tyson Chandler due back soon. | ||
| 19 | 2 Last Week: 21 | The committee (of one) dropped in on the Nets for the first time this season Jan. 2 in OKC. The big comeback there sparked the Nets to a 5-0 start in 2014. And yet Mikhail Prokhorov still hasn't offered to fly us to London for this week's overseas gig as a show of gratitude. What gives? | ||
| 20 | 5 Last Week: 25 | Really didn't want to put a damper on the Kings' first three-game win streak of the season -- especially when DeMarcus Cousins' offensive numbers have been so stout lately -- but it's hard to ignore Boogie's league-leading 10 techs when suspensions start at 16 and he's on pace for 25-ish. | ||
| 21 | 1 Last Week: 22 | Charlotte, New York and Cleveland are the teams in the East's bottom half still chasing the playoffs at any cost. And they're all whispering that Detroit is the team most likely to drop out of the East's top eight in the second half of the season, thanks to the Pistons' 6-12 funk since a 10-10 start. | ||
| 22 | 4 Last Week: 18 | No Jrue Holiday. No Ryan Anderson. No Tyreke Evans. How are the Pelicans going to win enough without those three to keep Anthony Davis -- and his 11 20-and-10 games after just six last season -- in the running for a spot in next month's All-Star Game in New Orleans? Right ... they can't. | ||
| 23 | 1 Last Week: 24 | While Kevin Durant was rumbling for 48 points, Gordon Hayward was becoming just the fourth player in Jazz annals (along with Karl Malone, Pete Maravich and Adrian Dantley) to ring up 37 points, 11 rebounds and 7 assists in the same game ... which Utah amazingly found a way to win. | ||
| 24 | 5 Last Week: 19 | The Bobs have dipped only slightly to No. 8 in defensive efficiency ... but even the smallest of backward steps is a thing when your offense is ranked 28th. With both New York teams starting to put it together, this 1-8 skid might be the beginning of the end for Charlotte's playoff fantasies. | ||
| 25 | 2 Last Week: 27 | One nightmarish visit to Sacramento and the humiliation of a 44-point shellacking quickly snuffed out whatever feel-good factor had been building in Cleveland after the arrival of Luol Deng and wins over bottom-feeding Philly and Utah. In other words, yes, I like this trade better for Chicago. | ||
| 26 | 3 Last Week: 23 | The Sixers had reigning Wimbledon ladies champ (and recently retired) Marion Bartoli in the house Friday night. Slick move to try to distract the tennis-loving committee (of one) after a week in which Philly went 0-4 against a quartet of teams that, Knicks aside, ain't exactly rolling. | ||
| 27 | 1 Last Week: 26 | Mike Brown's return to Los Angeles on Tuesday night for the first time since he was fired by the Lakers is the secondary story. Far bigger for the injury-ravaged Lakers, while stuck in this 1-10 spiral, is the fact that 10 of the next 12 games on the other side of Brown's visit are on the road. | ||
| 28 |
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Last Week: 28 | The question isn't so much When will Rajon Rondo return? as it is How many wins will the Celts notch between now and then? Boston is 0-7 in its road-heavy start to 2014 and can only point to about three games in January (Lakers and Sixers at home, Orlando away) that offer hope. | ||
| 29 |
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Last Week: 29 | Quite bummed to hear our lone scheduled exposure to Nikola Vucevic this season will fall prey Monday night to the concussion Vucevic just suffered. Poor Jacque Vaughn -- who we're obligated to remind you is the brother of former CS Fullerton guard Marlon Vaughn -- is 0-9 without Nik. | ||
| 30 |
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Last Week: 30 | Leave it yet again to our own Kevin Arnovitz to devote time and energy to quality Bucks coverage no matter how ugly things get on Milwaukee's fancy new floor. KA has a sitdown with The Greek Freak on TrueHoop TV to give our friends down at Major Goolsby's something to watch. | ||
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