Power Rankings: Lakers, Bulls battle for top spot
Week: Team:
Only a historic run since the All-Star break is keeping the Los Angeles Lakers ahead of the hard-charging Chicago Bulls in ESPN.com's weekly NBA Power Rankings.
To answer the Bulls' 4-0 week, L.A. became just the fifth team since the league introduced the All-Star Game in 1951 to post a 15-1 record out of the break. (Three of their four predecessors -- Detroit in 1989-90, Chicago in 1990-91 and the Lakers themselves in 1999-2000) -- went on to win the championship.)
As for the most notable changes in the top 10, with just over two weeks left in the regular season, San Antonio (down to No. 5 as much because of injuries to Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili as its rare three-game losing streak) and Boston (No. 6 after losing six of 10 and then nearly blowing a 25-point lead at home to lowly Minnesota) are about as low as you'll ever see them. Miami and Dallas took advantage of the Spurs' and Celtics' dips to climb to No. 3 and No. 4, respectively.
Click here to rank the teams yourself or click here to comment on this week's fully nonautomated pulse check of the league's 30 teams, which is compiled with Steve Nash-ian assists from ESPN Stats & Info and the Elias Sports Bureau.
Also, check out John Hollinger's daily Power Rankings.
| 2010-11 Power Rankings: Week 22 | ||||
| RANK | TEAM / RECORD | TRENDING | COMMENTS | |
| 1 |  | -- Last Week: 1 | Only three times in the last 10 seasons has the team with the best record after the All-Star break won it all. The way that the reigning champs have been rolling, that amounts to a ray of hope for the rest of the field. | |
| 2 |  | -- Last Week: 2 | Remember our recent suggestion in this cyberspace that the Bulls had to spruce up that pedestrian 15-13 road record? Check. They're 6-2 on the road since to help cement their status as the league's clear-cut No. 2. | |
| 3 |  | 1 Last Week: 4 | With seven of their nine games left against teams with losing records -- and knowing how clinical they are (32-5) against the sub-.500 set -- you can't completely dismiss the Heat's chances of snagging the East's top seed. | |
| 4 |  | 2 Last Week: 6 | Caron Butler (knee) continues to insist he'll be back at some stage in the playoffs, but Dallas has an effective replacement if it can keep Peja healthy. How effective? The Mavs are 15-0 when Peja plays at least 15 minutes. | |
| 5 |  | 2 Last Week: 3 | How bad are the Timmy (ankle) and Manu (thigh bruise) injuries? Serious enough, after a season of largely good health, to prompt rising panic in Alamo Country about holding onto the No. 1 seed, playoff prospects, etc. | |
| 6 |  | 1 Last Week: 5 | One more time in case you haven't heard it: Friday's collapse against Charlotte marked the first time in Celts history that they fell to a team 10 or more games under .500 after leading by 10 or more to start the fourth. | |
| 7 |  | 3 Last Week: 10 | The COY ballot is officially impossible thanks to what the Nuggets have done (12-4) minus Melo. George Karl's work, pre- and post-trade ... who's been better? Can't conclusively say Thibodeau, Popovich, whoever. | |
| 8 |  | 1 Last Week: 7 | Don't think anyone in OKC will mind too much at 11-2 in March, but Durant is in the midst of his lowest-scoring month all season (25.1 ppg) and almost never gets mentioned in an MVP race he was widely tipped to win. | |
| 9 |  | -- Last Week: 9 | This probably speaks more to the ongoing Boston funk and Miami's recent 5-6 stretch against .500-or-better teams, but Orlando actually has the East's second-best record since the All-Star break ... at a modest 11-5. | |
| 10 |  | 1 Last Week: 11 | One of the questions of the season: How are the Grizz -- now 10-6 against the West's top four and who just went 2-1 in a Boston/Chicago/San Antonio stretch with the first two on the road -- only a No. 8 seed? | |
| 11 |  | 3 Last Week: 8 | Some decent trivia from Elias that I didn't see coming: Do you know what Gerald Wallace has in common with Tim Duncan, Chris Webber and Walt Frazier? All of them have five career 40-point games after Wallace's latest. | |
| 12 |  | -- Last Week: 12 | What does the league's No. 3 record (12-4) since the All-Star break get you? In the Rockets' case, it likely still leaves them needing an 8-1 finish and a Hornets fold after losing D-West just to get into the tournament. | |
| 13 | New Orleans 42-32 | -- Last Week: 13 | The problem for the Hornets, even if they hang on to a playoff spot, is that they're going to see San Antonio without noted Spurs killer D-West ... or stay matched up with the Lakers. Which would probably be worse. | |
| 14 |  | -- Last Week: 14 | Only five East teams have winning records since the All-Star break and this ain't one of them. Philly's home loss to Sacramento helped the disengaged Hawks more than anything they've done lately to help themselves. | |
| 15 |  | -- Last Week: 15 | Something tells me Philly, after feeling sneaky good about the potential Miami matchup in Round 1, wouldn't mind seeing the Heat move up to No. 2 after surrendering 71 points to LeBron and D-Wade on Friday night. | |
| 16 |  | -- Last Week: 16 | Nash has quietly wrested the assist lead away from Rondo, but I grudgingly have to concede that the best efforts of Captain Canada, Grant Hill and the best sixth man no one talks about -- Marcin Gortat -- won't be enough. | |
| 17 |  | 1 Last Week: 18 | The risk now is overhyping Hansbrough after the March he's had, but there's no disputing the fact that he crucially hatched his breakout right when the standard short-term spike from the coaching change had worn off. | |
| 18 | Charlotte 30-42 | 5 Last Week: 23 | The "race" for No. 8 in the East in a nutshell: Losing nine of their first 11 games in March couldn't knock the Bobs out. Instead? Weekend wins over the Celtics and Knicks make them the "hot" team in this "race." | |
| 19 |  | 2 Last Week: 21 | Road woes extinguished whatever playoff fantasies Golden State had, and here's at least one source of its travel trouble: Monta averages 27.8 ppg at home and 20.8 ppg on the road. It's the league's largest discrepancy. | |
| 20 |  | -- Last Week: 20 | Anyone worried that working Redd back into the flow might mess up chemistry at this critical juncture? If the Bucks couldn't handle Sacramento at home in the must-win portion of the season ... what chemistry? | |
| 21 |  | 4 Last Week: 17 | Ouch continued: Melo is chafing under the spotlight he thought would be "easy" to handle, Amare looks drained and confused trying to learn how to play alongside him and Chauncey is both ailing and a questionable fit. | |
| 22 |  | -- Last Week: 22 | The romantic in me wants to believe that this is a playoff team if Gordon hadn't missed 26 games (during which the Clips went 7-19). But the realist in me shouts back with reminders about L.A.'s weak bench and 1-13 start. | |
| 23 |  | 4 Last Week: 19 | Overtime had been Utah's time all season until Thursday's crazy home L to New Orleans -- relive the prayer Okafor banked in at the regulation horn here -- dropped the crumbling Jazz (9-25 since a 27-13 start) to 5-1 in OT. | |
| 24 |  | 3 Last Week: 27 | They're not just playoff spoilers. Back-to-back-to-back wins in Milwaukee, Indy and Philly got the Kings in the same sentence with Dallas ... since they're the only two teams better on the road than they are at home. | |
| 25 |  | 1 Last Week: 26 | Only because my oldest (Alexander The Greatest) is inexplicably such a big Jerebko fan do I divert the focus away from Detroit's dysfunction to ask if you like the Monroe-Daye-Jerebko (when healthy) trio's promise. | |
| 26 | New Jersey 23-49 | 2 Last Week: 24 | Relieved to hear that D-Will is going to try to test that bad wrist this week. A third straight week with an entry from Kris Humphries' life-changing season -- he's at 14.1 rpg since the All-Star break -- is pushing it. | |
| 27 |  | 2 Last Week: 25 | Something tells me you weren't terribly surprised -- even after their seemingly miraculous win at OKC as recently as March 20 -- that the Raps followed up that stunner with road L's to the Nuggets, Suns, Dubs and Clips. | |
| 28 |  | -- Last Week: 28 | As if the swirling speculation about his job and losing Love to a groin injury wasn't enough, Rambis' Wolves still have Chicago and Miami left in a seven-game stretch that also featured the Lakers, Mavs, Thunder and Celts. | |
| 29 |  | -- Last Week: 29 | There haven't been many happy Mondays for Cavs fans. So let's focus this one on Sunday night's uplifting return of iconic radio broadcaster Joe Tait as opposed to LeBron's second visit to the Q coming Tuesday night. | |
| 30 |  | -- Last Week: 30 | So much for joking about how VCU should get the Wizards' spot. Never gave the Rams much thought beyond Eric Maynor and Larry Sanders, but I do know now they're not close enough to DC to attempt that regional reach. | |
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