Four short titles take Dallas to 2021-22 west lineal hoop championship

The Dallas Mavericks won eight games of the Western lineal basketball championship in 2020-21, twice as many as any other team. The Mavs moved up to fourth in the all-time standings.

The Western lineal championship in pro basketball played out for only 38 games in 2020-21, with the Dallas Mavericks emerging as the top team with eight games of championship.

Outside of the Mavericks, this lineal was a balanced affair. The Denver Nuggets, Golden State Warriors, Houston Rockets and Utah Jazz all tied for second place with four wins each, while the Lakers and Clippers each had three.

Throughout the season, this championship got around and no one could defend it more than three times. The Mavericks, Nuggets and Rockets all were on four wins before the Mavs won at Denver, 116-103, taking the title and the lead with five wins. 

In the next couple of weeks, the Mavs played for the championship six times and won only three of them. Included were back-to-backs against the Clippers and Portland in which Dallas lost the first game and won the second, taking the title to the next stop. The wins the Mavericks did get were enough to give them the season championship in West.

The Warriors still lead all-time in the Western lineal with 50 games of the championship since tracking began at the start of the 2015-16 season. With their 18 games of Western lineal in 2019-20, the Lakers have made a huge move in the last three years and now are tied for second all-time with the San Antonio Spurs at 29. The Oklahoma City Thunder is third with 26, followed by the Mavericks (24), the Utah Jazz (21) and the Clippers (20).

Huge Warrior cushion should hold all-time basketball lead

It would appear that the Golden State Warriors NBA dynasty has come to an end. Right through the teeth of that dynasty, though, the Warriors built a huge four-year lead in the men's American professional basketball traveling championship.

Here is Stephen Curry, left, during lofty days for the Golden State Warriors, launching against Marcin Gortat, then with the Washington Wizards (Keith Allison/Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license).

The all-time traveling championship standings across American professional basketball invite us to remember that it's not where you start, but where you finish.

Where these standings will finish, of course, no one knows. But we do know how they started. The Golden State Warriors, as the NBA champions for 2014-15, were given the traveling championship provisionally when we began tracking this title in 2015-16. The Warriors promptly made their title considerably more than provisional, winning their first 24 games of the season and making a cushion in the traveling championship that they maintain to this day.

Entering 2019-20, the Warriors hold 54 games of championship, 30 more than any other team. Even if we subtracted all 24 games of that first provisional defense, the Warriors still would lead these standings by a comfortable margin.

The next team on the list, the Miami Heat, has 24 wins. Then, the standings thicken up a bit. With 22 games of title, the Toronto Raptors are third, followed by the Clippers and Portland Trail Blazers, each with 20 wins. The San Antonio Spurs and Houston Rockets each have 18 victories in the four-year history of this championship through the 2018-19 season.

Following are the complete standings across the top level of American (and Canadian) pro basketball from the start of the 2015-16 season, when we began tracking, to the end of the 2018-19 season:

Only one NBA team hadn't yet won the league-wide traveling championship through its first four years. The Phoenix Suns failed in all 10 of their challenges. The Memphis Grizzlies and Minnesota Timberwolves each had one game of championship.

Of 30 teams in the NBA, only nine carried winning records for the traveling championship. Those would be the seven teams already mentioned, plus the next two on the all-time standings. The Boston Celtics are in eighth place with 16 wins, followed by the New Orleans Pelicans with 14.

In four years of running this championship, it went on the line 321 times through 2018-19, with the title changing hands 132 times. The average title lasted 2.43 games.

Starting the 2019-20 season, the Lakers took the early lead with four straight wins in November, but they now have been caught by the Rockets, who won it from the Clippers on November 11 and posted three defenses through Nov. 18.

Warriors return to - and remain on - the top of pro basketball

Golden State increased its historical lead in the traveling standings across pro basketball in 2018-19, winning the season's honors for the second time and qualifying for the new Elite Division in 2019-20.

Golden State returned to the winner's circle in the traveling pro basketball championship across all of the United States and Canada in 2018-19, capturing more games of title than any other team after taking two years off from winning the title.

The Warriors added up to 14 games of championship for the year, bringing their all-time total up to 54. The Warriors won 40 games of title in 2015-16, the first year this championship ran, and didn't win it again until Oct. 24, 2018, when it went on the road and defeated Washington, 144-122.

After beating the Wizards, Golden State added six defenses to the championship. The Warriors tacked on another seven-game championship in January, ending the season with 14 games of title. Second place was San Antonio, which finished with 10 games. Portland, with three games of title to end the season, totaled nine for the year.

The traveling championship secured for the Warriors a spot in the 2019-20 Elite Division after they failed to qualify in the pyramid. The Warriors held a healthy lead with the traveler when the Spurs took hold of it in late February, but the Spurs ripped out eight defenses, bringing themselves within five games of the Warriors when those teams met on March 18 in San Antonio.

The Spurs prevailed in that one, 111-105, pushing a critical head-to-head pyramid tiebreaker with Golden State in their favor. Now, the Spurs held the far inside track for fourth place in the First Division, which earns a spot in the Elite Division. And if the Spurs kept winning, they could have jeopardized Golden State's path to the Elite Division through the traveling championship, as well. But the Spurs lost their next game to Miami. Another threat to the Warriors came when San Antonio won the title from Atlanta on April 2. But the Spurs lost in their next outing at Denver.

With 54 games of title all-time through four years, Golden State has more than the next two teams, Miami (24) and Toronto (22), combined. The Clippers are fourth with 20, followed by San Antonio with 18.

Warriors barely over Lakers for west traveling title

Golden State won its third Western traveling pro basketball season title in 2018-19, but the race this time was closer than ever.

Golden State won the western traveling championship in pro basketball for the third year out of four in 2018-19, but the race was tighter than ever.

The Warriors and the Lakers both finished with eight wins, tied at the top. Golden State prevails for being 8-2 in its western traveler games, compared with 8-4 for the Lakers.

But the season was a big step up for the Lakers, who were 0-4 in western traveler games through 2017-18, then they lost the season opener at Portland. But the Lakers took the championship from Portland with a 114-110 road win on Nov. 3 and defended it seven times.

Houston, Portland and San Antonio all were right in this thick race, finishing with seven, six and five wins, respectively.

Golden State still leads these standings all-time with 46 wins after starting these proceedings with 22 wins as the provisional champion in 2015-16. San Antonio occupies a far distant second place with 19 wins all-time, followed by Oklahoma City with 16.

With Elite Division coming, pro basketball pyramid heats up

The oncoming Elite Division jacked up the stakes around the pro basketball ordinals in 2018-19, but even without it, the Toronto Raptors and Oklahoma City Thunder produced a percentage-points finish for the First Division championship.

The establishment of an Elite League for 2019-20, something along the lines of the main continental soccer championships, made the ordinal pyramid in professional basketball quite more thick in 2018-19, especially in the top division.

The elite league will be stocked in the same way that the similar leagues are stocked in North American baseball and hockey. The top four teams in the First Division from the previous year will be entered, as will the top three teams from the Second Division, the top two teams from the Third Division and the top team from the Fourth Division. Traveling champions also will qualify, if they haven't qualified in the pyramid.

In 2018-19, that led to a meaningful race for fourth place in the First Division. The race at the top finished tight, but really wasn't so much at the end.

Toronto and Oklahoma City were the best teams, tied in the games column. Toronto prevailed on percentage points, finishing 11-5 (.688) to 14-8 (.636) for the Thunder. The Raptors clinched it with a 123-114 overtime win at Oklahoma City on March 20, putting their record at 11-4 and OKC at 12-8. That guaranteed that Toronto would finish with the best percentage and no worse for tied on top in the games column. Turned out that OKC went to Toronto and won two days later, then finished with a win against Houston.

Down the standings a way, we had a logjam. As of March 15, Houston held third place at 10-10, followed by San Antonio and Golden State at 8-9 and the Clippers at 9-11. Two of those teams would go to the Elite League.

At 9-11, Utah still had a chance, but the Jazz was the seventh-place team and had the additional concern to avoid relegation. And they only had one First Division game left, anyway, against the Clippers on the final day of the season.

Down the backstretch, Houston went 3-0 to finish comfortably in third place. The Spurs and Warriors both were 3-1 in the last three weeks of the season. However, the Golden State loss and one of the San Antonio wins proved decisive, as the Spurs beat Golden State, 111-105, in San Antonio on March 18. The Clippers couldn't keep up, going 2-2 down the stretch.

When the smoke cleared, the Spurs and Warriors were tied for fourth place at 11-10 in the First Division. But the tiebreaker went to the Spurs for going 2-1 head-to-head against Golden State, crucially because of their March 18 victory.

The Clippers didn't make it into the Elite Division, but they survived for another year in the First Division with a 143-137 win against Utah on the final day of the season. Utah spent only one year in the First Division before being relegated back to the Second Division for 2019-20. Cleveland, a middle-of-the-pack First Division team even when it had LeBron James, fell to 2-14 and is headed to the Second Division in 2019-20.

The Second Division produced a tight race for promotion. Denver won it at 14-5, followed by Portland at 13-6. Boston finished one-half game behind promotional status, but will enter the Elite Division in 2019-20, as will Denver and Portland. At the bottom, Washington and Chicago are going down to the Third Division, but Atlanta, Dallas and New Orleans barely survived.

There was no contest in the Third Division. Philadelphia and Milwaukee clearly were the best two teams, so they will be promoted in 2019-20 to the Second Division and the Elite Division. At the bottom of this group, New York was notably terrible at 2-22. Detroit will join the Knicks in the Fourth Division in 2019-20.

Minnesota won the Fourth Division in 2018-19, allowing the Timberwolves to climb out of this bottom rung for the first time since we began tracking the pyramid in 2015-16. Moving up with the Timberwolves to the Third Division are the Brooklyn Nets.

Warriors sneak in for 2017-18 top tier title

The Golden State Warriors received the help they needed to win the pro basketball First Division in 2017-18, their second such championship in three years of the competition.

Less than two weeks remained of the NBA season on April 1, 2018, and four games in those final days would tell the tale in the First Division.

On that morning, the Houston Rockets led the top division at 14-4, followed by the Oklahoma City Thunder at 13-5 and the Golden State Warriors at 14-6.

The defending champs, the San Antonio Spurs were only 10-10 as April 1 dawned, but they were to have a huge impact on this race. They had just knocked the Thunder off Houston's heels with a 103-99 homecourt win on March 29. Later on April 1, the Rockets played in San Antonio, and the Spurs gave them the same treatment, a 100-83 beating that cut Houston's lead over the Thunder back down to one-half game.

By knocking down the Thunder and Rockets, the Spurs did quite a favor to the Warriors, who suddenly went to Oklahoma City on April 3 with a chance to take the division lead. They were 14-6, barely behind the Rockets (14-5) and the Thunder (13-5).

On a night when Kevin Durant shot pitifully for the Warriors, only nine-for-25 (including two-for-nine from three-point range), he still scored 34 because he was 14-for-14 at the free-throw line. The Warriors won, 111-107, and now led the division at 15-6.

One game remained: April 7, Oklahoma City at Houston. A win for the Rockets on their own court would end their First Division season with the championship. Otherwise, the Warriors would sneak in for their second top-tier title in three years of this exercise.

For most of its 10 years in Oklahoma City, the Thunder has worked at around 50 regular season victories and a round or two of playoffs. But the Thunder happened to have a down year in 2014-15 and missed the playoffs. Thus, Oklahoma City began this competition of ordinal divisions in the Third Division when these alignments were begun with the 2015-16 season.

But the Thunder rumbled quickly to the top tier. Blitzing through the Third Division with a championship 16-3 showing, it advanced to the Second Division for 2016-17. Once there, the Oklahomans fought off challenges from the Dallas Mavericks and Washington Wizards, finishing second to the Clippers and advancing this year to the top level.

So, they made it almost to the wire in 2017-18. Falling ever so short, the Thunder relished its role as spoiler on April 7 and hung a 108-102 victory over the Rockets, finishing in a second-place tie with its vanquished hosts at 14-6.

The bottom of the First Division was uncharacteristically weak. The Atlanta Hawks, all the way down to 2-15, finished last. The Hawks gave the Spurs their toughest challenge in 2016-17, finishing 1 1/2 games out of first place. Then they lost Paul Millsap and Tim Hardaway to free agency and traded Dwight Howard. Look out below.

Right with them, though are the Chicago Bulls, who finished 3-14 and will join the Hawks next season in the Second Division.

One promotional spot was up for grabs as of April 1 in the Second Division. The Utah Jazz already were comfortably in the clubhouse at 12-5, clinching the championship and the first promotion. The New Orleans Pelicans were uncomfortably in the clubhouse in third place at 10-8 and needed help.

In between, the Toronto Raptors were 11-8 with games coming up against the Boston Celtics and the Indiana Pacers. The Raptors only needed to win one for promotion, and they won both, leaving New Orleans to wait another year.

At the bottom of this group, the Pacers and Milwaukee Bucks were clearly the demotees. The standings make it appear that the Celtics and and Dallas Mavericks flirted with disaster, but it only looks like that because the Celtics lost their last two games and the Mavs lost their last three.

The Denver Nuggets and the Portland Trail Blazers stormed through the Third Division in 2017-18, earning promotion to the Second Division the next season. The Nuggets won the championship with an 88-82 homecourt win against Portland on April 3, holding the Blazers to 13 points in the fourth quarter.

At the bottom, the Orlando Magic and Memphis Grizzlies worked their way down. Orlando beat the New York Knickerbockers in April, but that just closed the gap.

The Philadelphia 76ers easily won the Fourth Division championship with an 11-3 record that was three games better than anyone else in this bottom group.

The Detroit Pistons squeezed to just enough better than even to beat the Lakers and Minnesota Timberwolves for the second promotion.

The Lakers were in the driver's seat through March 25, second place at 7-5 with their next game coming against the only team seriously chasing them, the 6-5 Pistons. On March 26, the Lakers went to Detroit to play that game, and lost, 112-106.

The Pistons, now in promotion position, increased their cushion with a 108-96 win at Brooklyn on April 1. But the Pistons, on their own court, were no match for the Sixers on April 4, losing 115-108.

Now, the Pistons were 8-6 and the Lakers were 7-6. Only one game remained, with the Lakers scheduled at home against the Timberwolves on April 6. A Lakers win would make them 8-6, tied with the Pistons. But the Lakers held the tie-breaker, despite their loss in Detroit. They split their two games, with the Lakers beating Detroit, 113-93, at Staples Center on Halloween. Thus, the Lakers won the next tiebreaker, going plus-14 in head-to-head point differential.

It mattered not one bit, as the Wolves stomped the Lakers, 113-93, blow torching through a second half that went 62-38 in their favor. So, the Lakers, a cellar-dwelling team for all three years of this arrangement, will try again to move up in 2018-19. It was widely speculated that free agent LeBron James was being recruited for the effort.

Jazz capture west hoop traveling title

The Utah Jazz didn't come close to maximizing their opportunities, but they won plenty enough to claim the western traveling pro basketball crown in 2017-18.

The Golden State Warriors are slowing down a bit in the western pro basketball traveling championship, but they're going to have to be real slow for a real long time before anyone catches them.

Though the Warriors won only five western title games on the 2017-18 slate, they remain the runaway leader in this competition historically. The Warriors now have 38 wins through three full years of the chase, well ahead of the second-place Oklahoma City Thunder with 21. In third place are the San Antonio Spurs (20), followed by the Utah Jazz (16) and the Clippers (14).

The Lakers are the only team yet to win the western traveler after three full years. They have only run into that chance four times, dropping all four games.

The Jazz were Team of the Year in 2017-18 with 12 wins, most in the West, and they didn't nearly maximize their opportunities, losing four title challenges. They book ended their season by carrying the title from 2016-17 and defending it once at the beginning, then producing a three-game title run in April. 

In between, their best moment came right before the All-Star break. The Jazz won the title from the Clippers with a 125-113 decision at home on Jan. 20, then held on for seven more games until the midseason pause. On returning from the break, the Jazz lost the title, 100-81, at home against the Portland Trail Blazers.

Raptors rip through hoop traveler, but Warriors still lead all-time.

The Toronto Raptors controlled the pro basketball traveling championship far more than any other team in 2017-18, but the Golden State Warriors still have controlled the title for the most games all-time.

                     

Once upon a time, 2015ish, it was decided that these pages would, from time to time, chronicle a traveling professional basketball championship across the best league in the world. Nothing unusual there – we do that in a lot of sports.

It made sense, starting the title with the 2015-16 season, to give the first defense to the Golden State Warriors, who had just won the NBA championship. It made additional sense when the Warriors assembled an incredible defense, a 24-game winning streak right out of the gate.

And that, alone, even if the Warriors hadn't won another traveling championship game through the 2017-18 season, would still be enough to give them the all-time lead.

As it happened, the Warriors enjoyed another 16-game championship streak later in the 2015-16 season and ended that year with a 40-2 record. That second streak ended on March 6, 2016, when the Lakers beat them, 112-95, at Staples Center.

From that day through the end of the 2017-18 season, The Warriors didn't win another game for the continental traveling championship. But they're still 40-5 historically, easily the best record across pro basketball.

Golden State's silence in the last two seasons says something else about this competition. Contrary to the all-time standings, there is no clearly dominant team here on a year-over-year basis. Only two teams, the Clippers and the Miami Heat, have put together two seasons in which they could win more than a half-dozen games. 

The Heat won seven games during the first season, then came back and won Team of the Year with 15 victories in 2016-17. But this year, they won only one game. That still gives them the second-most wins all-time with 23.

The Clippers lost all five of their bids for the title in 2015-16, but came back in 2016-17 with nine wins and in 2017-18 with seven wins, for 16 overall. That puts them in fourth place all time, behind the 2017-18 Team of the Year, the Toronto Raptors. All 17 wins the Raptors have ever counted for the title came in 2017-18, as the Raptors lost their four bids for the title during its first two seasons.

They figured it out in 2017-18, winning three titles, including a seven-game sprint right up to the All-Star break. The Raptors never again played for the title after that, but no one was catching them.

Heat streak of 12 secures Team of the Year in NBA traveler

The Miami Heat tore through the end of January and the start of February with 12 straight wins for the traveling championship across pro basketball, good enough for Team of the Year honors. But the Clippers put up a strong run at the end.

Goran Dragić was the game-high scorer four times and the high assist man five times during the Miami Heat's 12-game run with the traveling championship across pro basketball (Keith Allison/Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license).

The traveling championships aren't intended as a measure of which teams across any league are the best. After all, there is some luck involved in even getting the opportunity to play for it.

For example, it's pretty hard to argue right now against the Golden State Warriors as the best team in pro basketball. The Warriors won 15 of their last 16 regular season games, and now they've won all 13 of their playoff games. That's 28 wins in their last 29 games – absolute gold star dominance during the most important part of the season.

Where the traveling championship of pro basketball this year was concerned, the Warriors were a non-entity. Nothing against them. They just didn't have a lot of chances.

The Warriors played for the continental traveler only once, losing 105-102 on the road against the Miami Heat on January 23.

How would the traveling title have gone differently if Golden State had won that one opportunity? It's hard to say. 

But we do know this: The Heat was hot at the time. The Miami five had already won two straight with the traveling title, and would go on to win nine more in a row after that contest.

With that run of 12 straight wins for the traveling title, the Heat comes out as the overall Team of the Year, finishing the year 15-5 for the championship with three titles and 12 defenses in 15 attempts.

During that run of 12 straight traveling title wins for the Heat, the star was Hassan Whiteside, who was the high rebounder in seven of those games and the high scorer in two. Another stalwart was Goran Dragić, the high scorer in four games and the high assist man in five.

A strong case could be made for the Clippers who finished 9-1 with two titles, including a seven-game streak that ended the regular season. The Clippers will take the title to the start of the 2017-18 campaign.

All-time, the Warriors remain the all-team leader with the traveling title. After their 40-2 performance with the prize in 2015-16, the Warriors now are 40-3 overall. The Warriors have actually only won it once. They were the care-taker champs when this exercise began with the start of the 2015-16 season because they won the NBA title the year previous. Then, the Warriors tore off 24 wins before finally losing the title.

The Heat, though, has a way with this continental title. It now has won the seven times in two years, far more than any other team. The Heat is 22-10 in games for the league-wide traveling championship, making them second in all-time wins. The Heat has successfully defended the title 15 times in 22 attempts during the two-year history of the championship.

On their way to Finals, Warriors win West traveler

The Golden State Warriors enter the NBA Finals with 25 wins in their last 26 games. Ten of those wins carried them to the western traveling championship in professional basketball.

With Draymond Green's muscle, the Golden State Warriors streaked to the western pro basketball traveling championship (Keith Allison/Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license).

For much of the year, the Golden State Warriors disappeared from relevance in the western traveling championship of professional basketball.

It turned out to be a temporary condition.

After trouncing through the West last season, the Warriors were lukewarm in their first couple of runs at it in 2016-17. They lost in their first try, a 110-89 road loss to the Memphis Grizzlies on Dec. 10. It would be two months later, on Feb. 10, when they took their second try, again at Memphis, and this time they claimed the western title with a 122-107 win. Then, they failed to defend it.

As late as mid-March, the Grizzlies were looking like Team of the Year in the West. They were 9-3 with two championships and seven defenses in nine chances. No one else was close.

At the start of games on March 20, the Oklahoma City Thunder wore the crown, coating it with two defenses. But the Warriors visited that night, and that's when it all began to change.

Retrospectively, the whole NBA season was changing at around that time. The Warriors began March in the middle of a grueling road trip – eight games in eight different cities in 13 days. By the end of it, they were tattered, and Head Coach Steve Kerr rather famously tanked the final game on that swing, a 110-87 road loss to the San Antonio Spurs, by resting many of his best players. It was Golden State's third straight loss.

But the Warriors returned home, regrouped and won three straight in their own gym before going to Oklahoma City for a crack at the traveling championship. The Warriors then beat the Thunder soundly, 111-95, for their second western title of the year. And the Warriors kept winning.

No one could stop them. The Warriors won 10 straight for the title, 13 overall. Only three of those wins were single-digit margins. By the time someone finally beat the Warriors, they had it in the bag. That finally happened on April 10, when the Utah Jazz beat them, 105-99, on their own floor.

Only two days remained in the regular season. The Warriors were 11-3 with two titles and nine defenses in 11 tries. One huge surge at the end of the season put them over the top.

Utah went on to beat the San Antonio Spurs on the final day of the season to retain this championship entering 2017-18.

But the Warriors are the team to remember. In fact, they're the only team in the West still going after sweeping through the conference playoffs by knocking out the Portland Trail Blazers, the Jazz and the Spurs in four games each.

Now, the Warriors are going to the NBA Finals for another run at the Cleveland Cavaliers. They have won 25 of their last 26 games. The traveling championship of the West could be the least of their achievements by the time this is all done.

Spurs win top tier, Clippers going up

The San Antonio Spurs won the First Division across pro basketball, while last year's champs, the Golden State Warriors, fell to third. The Clippers, who were relegated last year, have fought their way back to the top level by winning the Second Division.

Kawhi Leonard (2) was instrumental in taking the San Antonio Spurs to the First Division championship (Jose Garcia/Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license).

By the end of March, the San Antonio Spurs were in the clubhouse with a 13-4 record in the First Division, good enough to clinch the championship and their second consecutive division title.

In 2015-16, the Spurs blitzed through the Second Division with an 18-1 mark to earn promotion. In 2016-17, the Spurs were just about as lightly challenged in the top tier, despite the presence of the Golden State Warriors, who won it a year earlier with the same 18-1 record. This season, the Warriors finished third in the First Division at 11-6, two games from the top.

The Boston Celtics, who were promoted to the First Division with the Spurs this year, are going back to the Second Division after finishing at the bottom of the First Division. They will be joined by the Toronto Raptors.

The Clippers, who were relegated to the Second Division this year, are headed back to the top division in 2017-18 after taking the Second Division championship. Going to the stretch, the Clippers held a 1/2-game lead on the Washington Wizards for the Second Division title. But the Clippers won their last two games, while the Wizards lost their final two, falling out of consideration for promotion. The Oklahoma City Thunder took the second promotion to the top tier with a 12-10 record.

The Portland Trail Blazers, who began as a First Division team in 2015-16, are being demoted for the second straight year. The Blazers finished at the bottom of the Second Division this season and will go down to the Third Division next season. Also being demoted are the Memphis Grizzlies.

A tight race in the Third Division ended with the New Orleans Pelicans and the Indiana Pacers being co-champions, barely beating out the New York Knickerbockers. 

The race to avoid relegation to the Fourth Division was equally tight. The three teams fighting for survival were the Detroit Pistons, the Orlando Magic and the Brooklyn Nets. In the end, Brooklyn finished last in the Third Division. Detroit and Orlando finished tied for the next worst record. However, the Magic won the tiebreaker with a 3-1 head-to-head record against Detroit, which will be a Fourth Division team next season.

The Denver Nuggets, who had been demoted to the Fourth Division this season, fought their way back to the Third Division by barely winning the bottom rung ahead of the Sacramento Kings. The Minnesota Timberwolves had good shot at promotion, but they lost their final two bottom level games against the Kings and the Lakers, opening the second promotion for the Kings.

Spurs join Warriors as dominant First Division champs

The San Antonio Spurs, promoted this season to the First Division, have stormed through the top level with a 13-3 record, already clinching the championship. Meanwhile, the Clippers aren't far from promotion – or a fight for promotion.

Chris Paul and Clippers are leading the way at the moment in the Second Division. But that could change quickly (Verse Photography/Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license).

Drama has been in short supply during the first two seasons of pro basketball's First Division. 

Each season has produced a dominant champion, with the San Antonio Spurs and their 13-3 performance this season following the Golden State Warriors and their 18-1 output last year. The Spurs already have clinched the title this year, holding a three-game lead on the Atlanta Hawks (10-6).

The relegation side, likewise, has little left to be decided. The Boston Celtics (7-13) and Toronto Raptors (6-13) are all but ticketed for the Second Division next season. The Houston Rockets (7-10) are the next team on that cut list, but they are not imperiled with two weeks left in the season.

Last season, the Rockets barely escaped relegation because the Clippers had too many injuries for that to happen. The Clippers slipped to the Second Division this year, along with the Portland Trail Blazers.

The Spurs were promoted to the First Division this season, along with the Celtics. But those two teams had radically different fortunes this season against the top tier.

Following last season's romp, the Warriors have settled into the third place this season, holding a 9-6 record.

As of now, the Clippers have the best total record in the Second Division, and they should be headed back to the First Division next season. But those waters remain murky.

The Clippers are 12-9 in the Second Division, tied with 8-6 Washington with a .571 winning percentage, though the Clippers hold a one-half game lead. However, the Wizards are at Staples Center Wednesday night for an important showdown with the Clippers. 

The Clippers would gain clarity with a win, which would clinch the Second Division championship and promotion back to the top level. But if the Wizards win, then they move into the top spot outright, and the Clippers would suddenly be fighting for promotion. 

The next team down is the 10-9 Dallas Mavericks. Following Wednesday night's game, the Clippers have one more game in the Second Division, coming on April 5 at home against Dallas. Along with that game, the Mavericks have two more Second Division games, both on the road against the faltering Memphis Grizzlies on Friday night and April 12. Washington closes out its Second Division season Friday night against the Utah Jazz in Salt Lake City.

The Oklahoma City Thunder (11-10) is right there with the Mavericks, and the Milwaukee Bucks (7-7) aren't far behind. The Thunder will play the Bucks at home on April 4, then finish out their Second Division schedule on April 5 at Memphis. The Bucks' game with Oklahoma City is their only remaining game in the Second Division.

Memphis and Portland are the two bottom teams in the Second Division, and both appear headed downstairs next year. Unless, somehow, the Jazz crumbles even worse.

Down in the Third Division, the New Orleans Pelicans are on a light schedule, being the only western team at that level. The Pelicans are in the clubhouse at 9-5. Their .643 winning percentage is the best in the third tier, though the Pelicans are a game behind the Indiana Pacers (15-9) in the games column. In the event that one team finishes first in percentage and another finishes first in the games behind column, those are the two teams being promoted. 

The New York Knicks (13-9) also remain in strong position for promotion. They have only two more games for making their case, both this week against the Miami Heat.

The standings on the bottom of the Third Division are tight. The Detroit Pistons (9-14), the Orlando Magic (8-13) and the Brooklyn Nets (7-13) all are fighting against relegation, which is the plight for the two teams finishing at the bottom of this level.

The Denver Nuggets, demoted to the Fourth Division this season, apparently will climb right back out. The Nuggets (11-6) hold a comfortable lead for the Fourth Division title. The Sacramento Kings (9-6) and Minnesota Timberwolves (8-6) are battling for the second promotional spot out of the basement.