The Los Angeles Lakers’ route to winning West Group C of the Emirates NBA Cup has two halves, and only one of them is theirs: beat the Sacramento Kings at home on Nov. 20, beat the San Antonio Spurs in San Antonio on Nov. 27, then have the Golden State Warriors lose two of their last three. The Golden State Warriors need nothing from anybody, and under one set of results not even all three remaining wins. No Group C game has been played since Nov. 6; the table below is unchanged.
| Team | Group record | Point differential (excl. OT) | Points for (excl. OT) | Games left |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Golden State Warriors | 1-0 | +17 | 112 | 3 |
| San Antonio Spurs | 1-0 | +15 | 124 | 3 |
| Los Angeles Lakers | 1-1 | −11 | 219 | 2 |
| Portland Trail Blazers | 0-1 | −6 | 118 | 3 |
| Sacramento Kings | 0-1 | −15 | 109 | 3 |
In a Five-Team Group, Head-to-Head Settles Every Two-Way Tie
Eight teams reach the knockout rounds: the winner of each of the six groups, plus one wild card per conference, which goes to the second-place team with the best group-play record. That is four teams from the West.
Teams level on record are separated by head-to-head record, then point differential excluding overtime, then total points scored excluding overtime, then last season’s regular-season record, and finally a random drawing. Each team plays the other four once, so any two teams here have met or will: a two-way tie always has a head-to-head result waiting, and one game cannot split.
That makes the Los Angeles Lakers’ requirement narrow. They beat the Portland Trail Blazers on Nov. 6, and winning their last two would give them head-to-head over the Sacramento Kings and the San Antonio Spurs as well, leaving the Golden State Warriors, who beat them on Oct. 30, as the only team a 3-1 Los Angeles Lakers finish could not outrank in a tie. Hence the single condition — win both, and have the Golden State Warriors end 2-2 or worse — and why the Golden State Warriors control this group and the Los Angeles Lakers do not.
The Golden State Warriors Would Benefit From a Sacramento Kings Win on Nov. 13
The Golden State Warriors visit the San Antonio Spurs on Nov. 13, host the Sacramento Kings on Nov. 25 and visit the Portland Trail Blazers on Nov. 27. Win all three and they finish 4-0, which nobody else can reach.
The scenario that matters: win the first two and they are 3-0 with one left, so no worse than 3-1. The Los Angeles Lakers and the San Antonio Spurs would both be capped at 3-1 having lost to them, which head-to-head settles their way, and the Sacramento Kings, beaten by the San Antonio Spurs and the Golden State Warriors, would be capped at 2-2. That leaves one team able to finish 3-1 holding head-to-head over them: the Portland Trail Blazers, who would need to win at Sacramento on Nov. 13, beat the San Antonio Spurs on Nov. 25, then beat the Golden State Warriors on Nov. 27.
Oddly, the Golden State Warriors want the Sacramento Kings — the team they host on Nov. 25 — to win on Nov. 13, because a Portland Trail Blazers loss in Sacramento caps them at 2-2 and removes the last team that could catch a 3-1 Golden State Warriors finish. It is the Nov. 13 result they have most riding on, and they are not in it.
The Los Angeles Lakers would handle the other one themselves. The Sacramento Kings reach 3-1 only by winning all three of theirs, so a Los Angeles Lakers win on Nov. 20, which their path requires anyway, caps the Kings at 2-2 — shutting the door on one of the two teams that could overtake the club they need to lose twice.
Where the Overtime Rule Would Decide One of These Paths
A group game that goes to overtime counts as a point differential of zero for both teams rather than the final margin, and overtime points do not count toward the total-points tiebreaker either. No Group C game has gone to overtime: all three ran four periods, so every figure above is simply the margin.
One scenario puts it to work: a three-way tie at 3-1 among the Golden State Warriors, Los Angeles Lakers and Portland Trail Blazers, head-to-head running in a circle — the Golden State Warriors over the Los Angeles Lakers, the Los Angeles Lakers over the Portland Trail Blazers, the Portland Trail Blazers over the Golden State Warriors. Each would be 1-1 against the other two, so it falls to differential, and were the Portland Trail Blazers’ Nov. 27 win to come in overtime it would bank zero for both sides, leaving the Golden State Warriors every point of the +17 from Oct. 30.
Nov. 25 Is the Earliest Night Group C Can Be Won With a Game to Spare
Nov. 13 settles nothing on its own. The loser in Sacramento falls to 0-2 and is capped at 2-2, which could still win a group where nobody reaches 3-1: nobody is out after Nov. 13, and nobody is through.
Nov. 25 is different. Two Golden State Warriors wins plus at least one Portland Trail Blazers loss across Nov. 13 and Nov. 25 would decide the group with the Nov. 27 games unplayed; a San Antonio Spurs variant does the same, two San Antonio Spurs wins plus a Los Angeles Lakers loss on Nov. 20. If the Portland Trail Blazers win both of theirs, nothing can be settled early.
That first branch also closes the Los Angeles Lakers’ group case on Nov. 25 whatever they do on Nov. 20, since a 3-0 Golden State Warriors team finishes no worse than 3-1 and owns the head-to-head. Their Nov. 27 trip to San Antonio would then be about the wild-card route that runs through two groups the Los Angeles Lakers do not play in.
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