Power Rankings: Celtics, Magic leap Lakers
Updated: November 2, 2009, 11:36 AM ET
By
Marc Stein | ESPN.com
Week: Team:
One week is all it took for the first shakeup at the top of ESPN.com's weekly NBA Power Rankings.
| ESPN.com Senior Writer Marc Stein |
| • Follow ESPN's NBA coverage on Twitter • Follow Marc Stein on Twitter • Read Marc at TrueHoop • Read Marc at ESPN.com • E-mail Marc |
One home loss to a Dallas team they've recently dominated combined with Pau Gasol's injury absence for the first three games of the season and the repeated early displays of dominance delivered by the Boston Celtics and Orlando Magic have bumped the Los Angeles Lakers from No. 1 down to No. 3 … with the 4-0 Celtics narrowly beating the 3-0 Magic for the top spot.
Other prominent movers on this Monday include Denver (up from No. 8 to No. 4 after Carmelo Anthony's offensive spree included 41 points in a Thursday night win in Portland), Dallas (rising one spot to No. 5 after finally winning on the Lakers' floor) and Miami (jumping from No. 16 to No. 11 with an unexpected 3-0 start).
Click here to rank the teams yourself, or click here to comment on these rankings.
| 2009-10 Power Rankings: Week 1 | ||||
| RANK | TEAM / RECORD | TRENDING | COMMENTS | |
| 1 |  | 1 Last Week: 2 | If the Rondo contract extension saga has been a distraction, imagine what kind of D we'll see from the C's when they're focused. They held the Hornets to 87 on Sunday and at times you were asking: "What's wrong?" | |
| 2 |  | 1 Last Week: 3 | Can a team make a statement with a road win at Toronto in the third game of the season? If so, this is what Orlando announced Sunday with Rashard, Vinsanity and Pietrus all missing: Deepest Team in the League! | |
| 3 |  | 2 Last Week: 1 | Is it just us or has Pau's absence illuminated a lack of dependable depth for the reigning champs compared to what, say, Orlando or Boston has assembled? Conclusions are ill-advised so early, but it's worth discussing. | |
| 4 |  | 4 Last Week: 8 | He has logged 117 minutes. And he has rung up 113 points. Anyone else get the feeling that Carmelo Anthony isn't particularly pleased with all this one-hit wonder stuff people have been saying about the Nuggets? | |
| 5 |  | 1 Last Week: 6 | A long-awaited road win over the Lakers, Josh Howard's potential return in a week's time and the bounce in Marion's step have almost made the Mavs forget how flat they looked on opening night against the Wiz. Almost. | |
| 6 |  | 1 Last Week: 5 | I think it's fair to say we wanted to see a little more juice from the Spurs on Thursday at Chicago in their first back-to-back set of the season after all the talk about how much deeper they got over the summer. Agreed? | |
| 7 |  | 3 Last Week: 4 | Don't want to blow an 0-2 start out of proportion, because the early schedule was no gimme, but facts is facts: 15 teams have won 65 games or more and Elias says only one (these Cavs) started the next season 0-2. | |
| 8 |  | 1 Last Week: 9 | You know who has not been impressed by a couple decent wins at home (over Indy and Washington) and one pounding inflicted by the Lakers? Joe Johnson. Said JJ after L.A. ran up a huge lead Sunday: "We're too soft." | |
| 9 |  | 2 Last Week: 7 | Opening Night '08 was way worse, when the Lakers humbled Portland on national TV and Oden went down. But this start has been no treat: Roy's shot is off, Aldridge has a bruised knee and Andre Miller isn't helping much. | |
| 10 |  | 2 Last Week: 12 | The weak comp in Week 1 will overshadow G-Hill's rebounding and Frye's 3s for some naysayers, but the Suns aren't apologizing. Not with J-Rich suspended for the first two games and a five-game East trip looming. | |
| 11 |  | 5 Last Week: 16 | Easy schedule or not, Miami impressed us almost as much in Week 1 as its more feared Florida neighbors. No one had D-Wade and his razor-thin crew sweeping their first three games by an average win margin of 14.3 ppg. | |
| 12 |  | 5 Last Week: 17 | Andray Blatche cracked the 20-point plateau three times last year. He's done it twice this year filling in for Jamison. That math should explain why we're pubbing Blatche here instead of more deserved raves for Arenas. | |
| 13 |  | 3 Last Week: 10 | One week in and all of last season's talking points have already been revived: Injuries (Korver and Okur), defense (very little displayed until the fourth quarter against the Clips) and, of course, uncertain futures (Boozer). | |
| 14 |  | 3 Last Week: 11 | Don't want to make too much of a three-game sample, so let's just say that Ben Gordon's absence has been somewhat noticeable so far, given that the Bulls have clanked 36 of the 43 triples they've hoisted. | |
| 15 |  | 1 Last Week: 14 | Sixers optimists would tell you that it took them until January last season to look as cohesive as they look already. We'll keep an open mind but can't ignore that the cohesiveness came against two lottery-bound teams. | |
| 16 |  | 1 Last Week: 15 | The Raps might rank as the toughest team to rate, with results -- home win over the Cavs, losses in Memphis and at home to depleted Orlando -- all over the board even with Bosh and Bargnani clearly ready to go. | |
| 17 |  | 3 Last Week: 20 | That they've won twice already shouldn't surprise you. You knew going in about the gutty little Rockets, no matter who's in the lineup. The shocker, if you're looking for one, is Ariza averaging 29.0 ppg in those wins. | |
| 18 | New Orleans 1-2 | 5 Last Week: 13 | Two games is way too soon to talk about coaching changes. Even in the hyper-speculative NBA. But I still wouldn't have wanted to be Byron Scott if the Hornets didn't pull out that home opener against the Kings' kiddies. | |
| 19 |  | 2 Last Week: 21 | We repeat: Give 'em time. A 2-0 launch was nice, especially when it includes a 1-0 road record, but Sunday's home test against Portland was an early reminder that the NW Division's young darlings are still evolving. | |
| 20 |  | 2 Last Week: 18 | Latest examples of how Twitter has changed the game: Villanueva responds to back-to-back Ls with a plea to fans to "NOT PRESS THE PANIC BUTTON" and a promise that "WE WILL BE MORE THAN ALL RIGHT." | |
| 21 | Charlotte 1-2 | 1 Last Week: 22 | It took exactly one game for Charlotte to make its own case that signing A.I. would have helped. They've always had trouble scoring, but even the Bobs had never scored fewer than 73 ... until Boston held them to 59. | |
| 22 |  | 3 Last Week: 19 | The gloom generated by Blake Griffin's knee injury has been replaced by plain old gloom after the Clips went scoreless for the final 4:42 of a home L to Dallas ... with Baron on the bench for all but 19 seconds of the fourth. | |
| 23 |  | 4 Last Week: 27 | Fun Bucks factoid to digest when you're not ripping yourself for underrating Brandon Jennings: Milwaukee has opened on the road for 25 seasons in a row! No one else in history has done so for more than 14 straight seasons. | |
| 24 |  | 4 Last Week: 28 | Considering they got drubbed at home in their opener by Detroit -- setting an unwanted NBA record with their ninth straight opening-night defeat -- all the offense we've seen since from the Grizz is pretty eye-catching. | |
| 25 |  | 2 Last Week: 23 | Tyler Hansbrough's rookie debut is still on hold thanks to a shin problem. Mike Dunleavy's return from a long-term knee injury remains uncertain. And Team Granger is not nearly deep enough to cope well without them. | |
| 26 |  | 3 Last Week: 29 | The comeback win over Jersey was nice, but nothing at this stage matters more than the recovery of Al Jefferson, who looked a little more like himself in Phoenix with 21 points ... after totaling 21 in the first two games. | |
| 27 |  | 3 Last Week: 24 | As if the Dubs don't have enough going on, they're still smarting from the one-point home L to Houston. Good thing their next four games (Grizz, Clips, Wolves at home and Sac-Town away) offer four chances to atone. | |
| 28 |  | 2 Last Week: 26 | Knicks fans have suffered so much for so long that we've made the benevolent decision to focus on a glimmer of positivity -- Gallinari's electric start -- as opposed to everything excruciating we've already seen. | |
| 29 | New Jersey 0-3 | 4 Last Week: 25 | The Nets are painfully thin and young (and counting down the days to 2010 free agency) even when Devin Harris is healthy. So we might as well keep talking about the incoming Russian billionaire if Harris is out injured. | |
| 30 |  | -- Last Week: 30 | As much as we'd like to dissect/dwell on Casspi's debut, we can't ignore the reality that any and all rookie discussion in Sacramento will focus on Tyreke Evans' recovery from a twisted ankle. Until Evans is back. | |
| ||||
ESPN Conversations
comments
