NBA Playoff Picture 2024: Bracket, Early Odds and Predictions (2024)

The 2024 NBA playoff bracket is set.

A wild slate of games Sunday finally coalesced the bracket in both conferences, with the Oklahoma City Thunder winning their fifth straight game to grab the West's No. 1 seed while the New York Knicks did the same to capture the No. 2 seed in the East.

The veteran Phoenix Suns were able to escape the Play-In Tournament by grabbing the No. 6 seed in the West, while the red-hot Philadelphia 76ers couldn't quite do the same in the East despite winning their last eight games.

With all of the moving parts finally decided, let's check in on the playoff bracket and quickly predict how the next couple of months will play out.

2024 NBA Playoff Bracket

The Play-In Tournament offers a polar opposite outlook in the East and West.

In the West, it's fair to wonder if the New Orleans Pelicans and Los Angeles Lakers might be better off fighting to lose their opening matchup to avoid the second-seeded Denver Nuggets.

Denver is the overwhelming favorite to win the West and is a much more difficult matchup than the upstart Oklahoma City Thunder, who are the youngest top seed in NBA history.

A No. 8 seed would never be favored over a No. 1, but the Lakers in particular would get heavy action on their side if they were to play the Thunder. That said, there's the obvious inherent risk involved in "tanking."

The Lakers or Pelicans would then be required to defeat the winner of the Golden State Warriors vs. Sacramento Kings matchup, and that's no easy task. There are few players on the planet you'd want to see less than Stephen Curry in an elimination game, and the Kings were a 46-win team in their own right; there's no easy win to be found.

By contrast, the Philadelphia 76ers and Miami Heat will be playing their play-in game like it's Game 7 of the NBA Finals. A loss would result in a potential matchup against the buzzsaw Boston Celtics, whereas a win offers them the relative reprieve of a matchup against the New York Knicks.

While the Knicks deserve credit for battling injuries all season to earn the No. 2 seed, they're still playing without All-Star Julius Randle. Center Mitchell Robinson hasn't quite worked his way back to form after a three-month absence, either.

Head coach Tom Thibodeau has done what he does best in the regular season, keeping things afloat with a skeleton crew, but that level of strain could come back to haunt New York in a seven-game series.

The Sixers have to monitor the status of Joel Embiid's knee, but they have a legitimate shot at pulling off an upset if they're able to sneak past the Heat.

2024 NBA Championship Odds

As far as the championship picture goes, it's hard to view this as anything more than a two-horse race.

The Celtics are the NBA's best team on paper and in practice. They dominated the regular season to the point there is almost no historical data equivalent. The last team to win their conference by at least 10 games was the 2016-17 Golden State Warriors, perhaps the greatest team in NBA history. The last team before that was the 2012-13 Miami Heat, also one of the best teams in league history.

Even if we acknowledge these Celtics aren't on that same level, historical data says we should at least pencil them in for a Finals berth. The Bucks have the best shot at beating Boston in a seven-game series, but that would require them to get out of their own way. Nothing about the Doc Rivers era in Milwaukee should give us confidence he can turn things around enough to unseat Boston. They also have to hold their breath that Giannis Antetokounmpo's injury heals in time for him to be 100 percent.

The West is a little murkier. The Thunder and Timberwolves have received a jarring lack of respect despite brilliant regular seasons. Both teams have a better point differential than Denver, and Oklahoma City's would have been the best in the NBA last season. There's a real chance we're at the beginning of something special with both franchises and failing to recognize it.

The Los Angeles Clippers, Phoenix Suns and Lakers also have superstar veterans desperately vying to add a ring to their collection as the time dwindles in their careers. If any one of those three teams can turn back the clock just enough over a seven-game series, it's hard to count them out.

That said, this season has increasingly felt like a collision course between Boston and Denver, and there's no reason to back down now. Nikola Jokic is the NBA's best player and one of the greatest offensive forces the game has ever seen. The Celtics have a cohesive, star-laden roster of their own and lost just four home games all season.

In a season where only one team felt truly in a class of its own, it's hard to see anything but the Celtics hoisting the Larry O'Brien Trophy.

Prediction: Celtics over Nuggets in 6.