The
2013–14 NBA season was the 68th season of the
National Basketball Association (NBA). The regular season began on Tuesday, October 29, 2013 with the
Indiana Pacers hosting a game against the
Orlando Magic followed by the 2012–13 NBA champions
Miami Heat hosting a game against the
Chicago Bulls followed by the
Los Angeles Lakers hosting a game against the
Los Angeles Clippers. The
2014 NBA All-Star Game was played on February 16, 2014, at the
Smoothie King Center in
New Orleans, Louisiana. Cleveland's
Kyrie Irving won the
NBA All-Star Game Most Valuable Player Award.
The regular season ended on April 16, 2014, and the playoffs began on
Saturday, April 19, 2014 and ended on June 15, 2014 with the
San Antonio Spurs defeating the Miami Heat in five games to win the
2014 NBA Finals.
Transactions
Free agency
Free agency negotiation started on July 1, 2013, with players being able to sign starting July 10, after the
July moratorium ended.
[1]
Coaching changes
Offseason
- On April 24, 2013, Mike Brown was rehired by the Cleveland Cavaliers as head coach.[7]
- On May 21, 2013, the Los Angeles Clippers announced that Vinny Del Negro will not return as head coach after three years with the team.[11]
- On June 25, 2013, the NBA
approved a trade of an unprotected 2015 NBA first round draft pick,
which included an anti-trade clause prohibiting the Clippers and Celtics
from engaging in future transactions between each other, including the
exchanging of players for the duration of the 2013–14 season, for the
release of the contract of Doc Rivers from the Boston Celtics, freeing him up to sign with the Los Angeles Clippers.[21]
In-Season
Preseason
The Preseason began on Saturday, October 5, 2013 and ended on Friday, October 25, 2013. Earlier in March 2013, Commissioner
David J. Stern announced that the
NBA will be playing its first Preseason Game in the
Philippines on October 10, 2013 at the
Mall of Asia Arena in
Manila featuring the
Houston Rockets versus the
Indiana Pacers. The arena was also the venue of the
2013 FIBA Asia Championship.
Regular season
The regular season began on Tuesday, October 29, 2013 with the
Indiana Pacers hosting a game against the
Orlando Magic.
The regular season ended on Wednesday, April 16, 2014. The season
featured the unveiling of national television games such as on Christmas
Day along with
Chicago Bulls at
Brooklyn Nets,
Oklahoma City Thunder at
New York Knicks,
Miami Heat at
Los Angeles Lakers,
Houston Rockets at
San Antonio Spurs and
Golden State Warriors at
Los Angeles Clippers, along with other highly anticipated games.
[25]
Standings
By division
By conference
Notes
- z – Clinched home court advantage for the entire playoffs
- c – Clinched home court advantage for the conference playoffs
- y – Clinched division title
- x – Clinched playoff spot
- * – Division champion
Statistics leaders
Individual statistic leaders
Individual game highs
Team statistic leaders
Awards
Yearly awards
- Most Valuable Player: Kevin Durant, Oklahoma City Thunder[26]
- Defensive Player of the Year: Joakim Noah, Chicago Bulls[27]
- Rookie of the Year: Michael Carter-Williams, Philadelphia 76ers[28]
- Sixth Man of the Year: Jamal Crawford, Los Angeles Clippers[29]
- Most Improved Player: Goran Dragić, Phoenix Suns[30]
- Coach of the Year: Gregg Popovich, San Antonio Spurs[31]
- Executive of the Year: R. C. Buford, San Antonio Spurs[32]
- Sportsmanship Award: Mike Conley, Memphis Grizzlies[33]
- J. Walter Kennedy Citizenship Award: Luol Deng, Cleveland Cavaliers[34]
- Twyman–Stokes Teammate of the Year Award: Shane Battier, Miami Heat[35]
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- NBA All-Defensive Second Team:
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- NBA All-Rookie Second Team:
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Players of the week
The following players were named the Eastern and Western Conference Players of the Week.
Players of the month
The following players were named the Eastern and Western Conference Players of the Month.
Rookies of the month
The following players were named the Eastern and Western Conference Rookies of the Month.
Coaches of the month
The following coaches were named the Eastern and Western Conference Coaches of the Month.
Playoffs
The 2014 NBA Playoffs began on Saturday, April 19, 2014, and concluded with the
2014 NBA Finals which began June 5, 2014.
ESPN broadcast the
Eastern Conference Finals, and
TNT will broadcast the
Western Conference Finals.
Bracket
* Division winner
Bold Series winner
italics Team with home-court advantage
Notable occurrences
- The New Orleans Hornets officially renamed their franchise to New Orleans Pelicans to begin the 2013–14 season.[80]
- The Charlotte Bobcats officially announced that the franchise would be renamed to the Charlotte Hornets
for the 2014–15 season. This will return the Hornets name to Charlotte
for the first time since the team now known as the Pelicans moved from
Charlotte to New Orleans after the 2001–02 season.
- The Cleveland Cavaliers win the #1 pick in the NBA draft for the second time in three years, as well as the fifth time in franchise history (1971, 1986, 2003, and 2011 were the previous four times), and selected Canadian forward Anthony Bennett of UNLV.
- The NBA officially implements a tournament system in both of their Summer League systems; the Oklahoma City Thunder and Golden State Warriors were the inaugural champions of the Orlando and Las Vegas Summer League Tournaments, beating out the Houston Rockets and Phoenix Suns respectively.
- The Portland Trail Blazers officially announced that the Rose Garden would be renamed to the Moda Center before the start of the season.
- The NBA Finals will return to the 2–2–1–1–1 format for the 2014 Finals, with the owners approving the format on October 23.[81][82] The NBA originally decided to have the NBA Finals enter a 2–3–2 format starting in the 1985 NBA Finals
in order to accommodate commercial travelling from the east to the west
and vice versa, as well as bring up economic advantages for marketing
and newspapers at the time.
- The NBA experiments with on-court advertising beginning this season. The Indiana Pacers court at Bankers Life Fieldhouse will be sponsored by the Indiana Economic Development Corporation with the slogan A State That Works. The Toronto Raptors court at Air Canada Centre will be sponsored by the Bank of Montreal, while the New York Knicks court at Madison Square Garden will be sponsored by Chase. The Miami Heat's American Airlines Arena court in November 2013 and the Golden State Warriors' Oracle Arena court on March 7, 2014 added Samsung Electronics as its on-court sponsor promoting the Samsung Galaxy. On January 11, 2014, the Philadelphia 76ers' Wells Fargo Center added PartyPoker.com as its on-court sponsor.[83]
- On October 29, the regular season opened with a record of 92 international players on the opening night rosters. The San Antonio Spurs set an NBA record of 10 international players.
- The Brooklyn Nets start out their season with Joe Prunty coaching their games against the Cleveland Cavaliers and Miami Heat instead of their original head coach Jason Kidd.
The reason why Prunty was coaching at the start of the Nets' season
instead of Kidd was due to Kidd serving a coaching suspension for having
a DUI in July 2013. Prunty would start the year off with 1–1 for the
Nets before Kidd came back and coached the team for the rest of the
season.
- Patrick Ewing coaches his first game ever as an interim head coach for the Charlotte Bobcats. He ended up coaching the Bobcats on November 8, 2013 against his former team, the New York Knicks, due to their coach Steve Clifford having heart surgery around that time period.[84] He would end up losing that game 101–91.
- In a double overtime game on December 3, 2013, rookies Victor Oladipo of the Orlando Magic and Michael Carter-Williams
of the Philadelphia 76ers recorded triple-doubles in the same game.
Oladipo recorded 26 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists in 52 minutes,
while Carter-Williams recorded 27 points, 12 rebounds and 10 assists in
47 minutes. These were the first career triple-doubles for both players.
This marked the first and only time in NBA history that two rookies
have recorded triple-doubles in the same game. The last time that two
players had recorded their first career triple-doubles in the same game
was when Detroit Pistons Donnie Butcher and Ray Scott
did it on March 14, 1964 (they were not rookies). It was also the first
time that two opponents had recorded triple-doubles in the same game
since Caron Butler and Baron Davis had done so on November 23, 2007. Philadelphia won the game 126–125.[85][86]
- The planned regular season game in Mexico City between the San Antonio Spurs and Minnesota Timberwolves on December 4 was postponed after a generator malfunction inside the Mexico City Arena. The rescheduled game was played on April 8, 2014 at Target Center in Minneapolis.[87]
- On December 6, 2013, Kyle Korver of the Atlanta Hawks
set a new NBA record for most consecutive (regular season) games with a
three-point field goal made with 90. The previous record holder was Dana Barros.[88][89] The streak ended at 127.
- On December 11, 2013, Antawn Jamison of the Los Angeles Clippers became the 39th player in NBA history to reach 20,000 career points.[90]
- On December 13, 2013, Kevin Garnett of the Brooklyn Nets
surpassed 14,000 career rebounds, becoming only the tenth player in NBA
history to do so. In reaching the milestone, Garnett also joined Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Karl Malone
as the only players to reach 25,000 points, 14,000 rebounds and 5,000
assists. He reached the milestone in the third quarter of a 99–103 road
loss to the Detroit Pistons.[91]
- On December 16, 2013, Joe Johnson
of the Brooklyn Nets scored 29 points in the third quarter of a 130–94
win over the Philadelphia 76ers. In the quarter Johnson made 10 of 13
shots from the field and tied an NBA record with 8 of 10 three pointers.[92]
- On December 23, 2013, Dirk Nowitzki of the Dallas Mavericks passed Alex English
for 13th place on the NBA's all-time scoring list with a 13-foot jumper
in the opening minute of the third quarter of a 111–104 road win over
the Houston Rockets.[93]
- On December 25, 2013, Russell Westbrook
of the Oklahoma City Thunder recorded the eighth triple-double on
Christmas Day in NBA history. He recorded 14 points, 13 rebounds and 10
assists in 29 minutes in a 123–94 road victory over the New York Knicks.
The win was also the largest margin of victory in a Christmas Day game
in NBA history.[94]
- On December 27, 2013, LeBron James of the Miami Heat passed Larry Bird and Gary Payton for 29th on the NBA's all-time scoring list. James did so in a 108–103 loss versus the Sacramento Kings.
- On January 16, 2014, the Houston Rockets
scored a season-high 73 points in the first half, and a season-low 19
points in the second half. That 54-point disparity is the largest by a
team in a game in NBA history. They ended up losing to the Oklahoma City Thunder 104–92.[95]
- On January 24, 2014, Carmelo Anthony of the New York Knicks scored a
career, franchise, and league season high 62 points against the
Charlotte Bobcats.
- On January 25, 2014, sophomore Terrence Ross of the Toronto Raptors scored a career-high 51 points against the Los Angeles Clippers. His 51 points tied a franchise-high.[96] Ross recorded the lowest season scoring average the year of a 50-point game,[97] averaging only 10.9 points.
- On January 31, 2014, the Brooklyn Nets recorded an all-time low of 17 rebounds in a 125–90 blowout loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder. This broke a record low of 18 rebounds that was originally recorded by the Detroit Pistons in a November 28, 2001 game against the Charlotte Hornets.
- David Stern officially retires as commissioner of the NBA on February 1, 2014. Adam Silver would end up taking his place as commissioner in the process, with Mark Tatum taking on the role of deputy commissioner in the process.
- The New Orleans Arena that the New Orleans Pelicans played under was re-branded as the Smoothie King Center
on February 5, 2014. Therefore, while some of the earlier games played
in New Orleans were under the New Orleans Arena name, further home
Pelicans games, as well as the All-Star break that happened from
February 14–16, 2014 will end up being mentioned as the Smoothie King
Center from now until at least 10 more NBA seasons.
- On February 23, Jason Collins signed a 10-day contract with the Brooklyn Nets, becoming the first openly gay athlete in North America's four major professional sports.[98]
- On March 3, LeBron James scored a career-high 61 points against the Charlotte Bobcats. His 61 points was also a franchise-high.[99]
- On March 4, Russell Westbrook
recorded the fastest triple-double since 1955. He recorded 13 points,
14 assists and 10 rebounds while playing only 20 minutes and 17 seconds
against the Philadelphia 76ers.[100]
- On March 16, 2014 with a 122–104 victory over the Utah Jazz, the San Antonio Spurs notched their 50th win of the season and extended their 50+ wins in a season streak to 15 seasons.
- The New York Knicks would assign former player and Chicago Bulls and Los Angeles Lakers coach Phil Jackson as the team's newest President of Basketball Operations on March 18, 2014.[101]
- On March 27, The Philadelphia 76ers tied a league record of 26 consecutive losses. This mark is currently tied with the 2010–11 Cleveland Cavaliers.[102]
- On April 11, 2014, Corey Brewer of the Minnesota Timberwolves scored a franchise record-tying and career-high 51 points against the Houston Rockets. He also joined Allen Iverson, Michael Jordan & Rick Barry as only players with 50 points & 6 steals in a game.[103]
- The San Antonio Spurs won their franchise-record 18 straight win against the Indiana Pacers.
The Spurs also finished March with a 16–0 record, the second time in
franchise history where they have a perfect month going back from the 1995-96 NBA season of the same month.
- The Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers failed to qualify for the playoffs. This marked the first time in 20 seasons that both teams missed the playoffs. For the Lakers, it marked the first time in nine seasons that they missed the playoffs.[105] With the New York Knicks also missing the playoffs, this marked the first time in NBA history that none of the three teams qualified for the playoffs.[106]
- On April 25, 2014, TMZ leaked an audio recording of Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling allegedly making racist comments to his girlfriend. The NBA has launched an investigation.[107]
The team held a meeting the following day to discuss the incident. Both
coaches and players reportedly expressed anger toward the comment and
they briefly raised the possibility of boycotting Game 4 of their series
against the Golden State Warriors before deciding against it.[108] On April 29, 2014, Commissioner Adam Silver
banned Sterling for life as well as fining him $2.5 million. Silver
also began proceeding of forcing Sterling out of the league.[109]
- On April 28, 2014, the Memphis Grizzlies and Oklahoma City Thunder
played in their fourth straight overtime game, the first time in NBA
playoff history that there have been four straight overtime games.[110]
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