Right now, 12 of the 16 NBA playoff teams are locked in, but we have eight teams fighting for the final four spots and the right to try to shock the world by knocking off a true title threat in the first round. Who do the numbers like to advance through the NBA play-in tournament?
What Is the NBA Play-In Tournament?
The NBA play-in tournament sounds more complicated than it is. It’s not drastically different than the first few games of March Madness to determine the last few teams — it’s a way to keep more teams in the mix and increase the chance for a Cinderella situation.
In theory, it makes sense. In practice, less so. Thus far, the two highest seeds in the play-in in both conferences have ended up punching their ticket to the postseason, and that follows given the advantage they are set up to have.
Play-In Round 1:
- Game 1: 7-seed vs. 8-seed, winner earns the 7-seed
- Game 2: 9-seed vs. 10-seed, loser is eliminated
Play-In Round 2:
- Game 3: Loser of Game 1 vs. Winner of Game 2, winner earns the 8-seed
Due to the top-heavy nature of this sport, asking any of the eight teams taking part in the play-in tournament to take down one of the top-two seeds in either conference is a monumental task. That said, you can’t be the story of the dance if you don’t attend, and these teams are going to fight tooth and nail for their invite.
NBA Play-In Tournament Teams and Matchups: East
Orlando Magic
Path: The Orlando Magic can earn the right to face off with the defending champion Boston Celtics with a home win over the Atlanta Hawks on Tuesday night. Should they, as a five-point favorite, come up short in that game, they’d have to beat the winner of Wednesday’s Heat-Bulls game on Friday night to line up across from the Cleveland Cavaliers in the first round.
Why They Could Advance: For a second straight season, the Magic rank as a top-three defense thanks to ranking in the top quarter of the league in opponent 3-point rate. Jalen Suggs (arthroscopic knee surgery) is out, so they will miss his defensive versatility, but that’s been the case for the past 2.5 months and they’ve maintained their strong numbers on that end of the court thanks to their length.
Why They Could Struggle: It’s not complicated. In an era that has made putting the ball in the bucket as easy as it’s ever been, this team, at times, makes it look like we are still playing on peach baskets. During a five-game skid in the middle of January, Orlando scored 459 points, a total that is on average for what many teams score in four games.
Franz Wagner and Paolo Banchero are two weapons that are capable of scoring at a high level from within 20-feet of the bucket, but sans Suggs, there is no consistent respect for this team’s perimeter scoring, and I don’t see that changing at any point for the remainder of this season.
READ MORE: 2025 NBA Mock Draft
Could They Upset a Top-2 Seed? They went down in seven games against the Cavaliers last season, battling but never winning on the road. I’m not ready to say they’re cured from those struggles, but they did down the Bucks and Cavaliers on the road in March — a positive sign if they are going to shock the world.
At the end of the day, I have no plans on backing this team in any fashion should they survive the play-in tournament. I believe they are positioned better to be competitive during the postseason than the regular season, but asking them to win four of seven against the Cavaliers or Celtics is a step too far. I don’t think they get swept, but winning three games is something I’d bet against, let alone stealing home court at some point and advancing.
Atlanta Hawks
Path: If the Hawks can upset the Magic in Orlando on Tuesday, they earn the East’s seven-seed and, thus, a first-round series with the Boston Celtics. Should they lose that game, they’ll host the winner of Heat-Bulls with the eight-seed (a date with the Cavaliers) on the line.
Why They Could Advance: A showman like Trae Young is capable of doing special things in a limited sample like the play-in tournament, and that is how Atlanta escapes this event. His play-making, both for himself and others, needs to be on full display — something that could well happen given how much this team has leaned into their pace.
By running their offense in space, Young is able to function at the peak of his powers, something we’ve seen not only in his always-impressive assist numbers but for this team as a whole, ranking top-10 in free-throw-to-field-goal rate. They’ve been able to generate reasonable looks at the bucket on a consistent basis for the bulk of the season, and if they can inspire a track meet, they are capable of beating anyone in the league across a 48-minute sample.
A seven-game series is a different situation, but that’s not what is required for Atlanta to earn an invite to the postseason.
Why They Could Struggle: The Hawks were bounced out of the play-in tournament last season because they gave up 110 points to the Bulls through three quarters and couldn’t find a way to shake Young free (four-of-12 shooting with six turnovers).
Why can’t that happen again? Young remains reliant on his longball accuracy, and if the past handful of years have taught us anything, it’s that he is among the more variant producers in a stat that is largely volatile in the first place.
The Hawks rank in the bottom third of the league in turnover rate, and since I’m not confident that they can string together stops or consistently take good shots on the offensive end, a limited number of possessions could result in another season without a real playoff game on their resume.
Could They Upset a Top-2 Seed? The Hawks have players who can dominate for stretches of time in their specific lane, but I worry about a lack of versatility. Young can get rolling on the offensive end but struggles to hold his own on the other side. Dyson Daniels has established himself as one of the more opportunistic defenders in the sport, but his offensive game is still very much a work in progress.
I’d be surprised if this team were to get swept in the first round should they get there, but I’d be just as surprised if they put together two consecutive quality performances, and that caps their potential against the elites in a significant way.
Chicago Bulls
Path: The Chicago Bulls, as a one-point opening favorite, need to beat the visiting Miami Heat on Wednesday night to keep their playoff hopes alive. Should they do that, they will travel to face the loser of Tuesday’s Hawks-Magic game, aiming to earn the right to face the Cavaliers in the first round.
Why They Could Advance: If you’re rooting for fun and believe these play-in games operate at tempo, the Bulls might be the best bet you can make. With Josh Giddey a nightly triple-double threat in an offense that plays to his liking and Coby White a fearless bucket-getter, this team can compete in a shootout with anyone in the league (second in fastbreak efficiency), title contenders included.
Can they dictate tempo at that level in the postseason against high-level competition? That’s a different question, but they are an analytics dream (top-five in percentage of points scored via the triple with a plus-80% conversion rate from the free-throw line), and that gives them a great shot to advance past the play-in festivities for the first time in the three seasons in which it has been installed.
Why They Could Struggle: You’d expect a pace-oriented team to thrive at making opponents uncomfortable, but that hasn’t been the case, as the Bulls’ defense is bottom-three in both steal and turnover rate.
Those struggles make getting out in transition difficult, and a bottom-five offensive rebound rate is another knock against their ability to generate high percentage looks at the rim. Chicago, more than any team in the play-in tournament and potentially more than any other team still playing basketball, needs the game flow to work a certain way for them to have a chance and if that evaporates, so do their chances at a true postseason berth.
Could They Upset a Top-2 Seed? White had a career year in scoring last year and was even better this year — he’d have to level up a step or two further for this team to really scare either of the top seeds. His assist-to-turnover rate has declined in consecutive seasons, and his ratio this season was his worst since his rookie campaign. That’s a problem given the level both Boston and Cleveland are capable of defending at.
There is nothing we’ve seen over the course of 82 regular-season games that suggests that this version of the Bulls can defend at a high enough level to make noise outside of the play-in tournament.
Miami Heat
The Heat need to win consecutive games to qualify for the postseason, the first coming on Wednesday night in Chicago. Survive that coin toss game, and they’ll be a road underdog against the loser of Tuesday’s Hawks-Magic game with the eight-seed on the line.
Why They Could Advance: The short answer? This is unofficially the play-in tournament, sponsored by the Heat. They’ve participated and advanced in the prior two instances and are thus comfortable with the do-or-die nature of things in this unique setting.
From an on-the-court perspective, a bet on this team to advance is essentially a bet on Tyler Herro. In this event last season, the shooting guard was featured and that includes a game in which Jimmy Butler was active — something that obviously won’t be the case this time around.
And by “featured”, I mean featured.
Maybe it’s irresponsible to highlight a two-game sample against an entire postseason, but I’m trying to make a point.
- 2024 Play-in Herro: 25.6% of Heat shots, involved in 46.1% of their buckets
- 2014 Playoff LeBron: 23.5% of Heat shots, involved in 40.7% of their buckets
Free throws aren’t factored into those stats at all, and that’s been an area of growth for Miami’s top option: Herro flirted with 300 made free throws this season after attempting a total of 293 over the previous two years combined.
Erik Spoelstra might be the best coach in the sport, so if you view these four teams as reasonably interchangeable, I’m not sure how you avoid penciling them into the postseason.
Why They Could Struggle: Who scares you after Herro and Bam Adebayo?
Terry Rozier is having the worst 3-point shooting of his career (minimum 100 attempts), and as much fun as it is when Duncan Robinson gets hot, he’s still a simple defensive assignment (under one two-point bucket scored for every 25 minutes of playing time during his career). Heck, I like Davion Mitchell’s trajectory more than most, but he’s not ready to be handling double-digit shot attempts on a nightly basis, and that is what has been asked of him lately due to a lack of depth.
Any struggles on the offensive end figure to be damning for a team that ranks dead last in the NBA in block rate. If you’re losing the battle of easy buckets on a consistent basis, you’re going to have a hard time making any sort of run — play-in tournament included.
Could They Upset a Top-2 Seed? I’d argue that the ceiling of the Heat is higher than any of the other three play-in teams in the East, and that gives them a puncher’s chance but nothing more. Adebayo attempted just 104 triples through his first seven seasons, a number he’s more than doubled this year. If he can really get rolling and be a matchup nightmare, maybe Miami steals homecourt advantage and makes things interesting.
Maybe.
Even if that were to be the case, getting them to four of seven is unlikely. This team is as bad as anyone in the mix when facing winning teams this season, struggling to win one of every four such games, so how could you realistically pick them four times in seven games with confidence against a true title contender?
NBA Play-In Tournament Teams and Matchups: West
Golden State Warriors
Path: The Golden State Warriors are heavily favored (-265 in the opening moneyline market) against the Memphis Grizzlies on Tuesday night. Take care of business and they’ll face an upstart Houston Rockets team. If they fall, they’ll have to top the winner of Kings-Mavericks to earn the final playoff spot and face off in a best-of-seven series with the top team in the NBA, the Oklahoma City Thunder.
Why They Could Advance: It goes without saying that any team with Stephen Curry on their roster has a shot at getting hot — for four quarters or for two months. Jimmy Butler has added a different dimension to this team, and that’s what differentiates this version of the Warriors from recent editions.
Buddy Hield and Brandin Podziemski aren’t the most consistent options, but together, Golden State has a third scoring option that allows Draymond Green to fill his traditional role without being pressed to overextend.
The Warriors can still be too loose with the ball at times, but their turnover rate has checked in better than the league average for the first time since 2012, and if they are getting shots off, they are live to beat any team in the NBA.
Why They Could Struggle: They struggled coming home (2-3 in their final five games with seeding very much on the line), and offensive slumps were to blame. Across those three defeats, they failed to clear 25 points in five individual quarters, something that has the potential to sink you in a hurry given how the game is played today.
Do they know what they want out of their rotation? Jonathan Kuminga was a DNP-CD on Sunday against the Los Angeles Clippers, but that may have been more the result of Butler finding a rhythm. The depth of this team is a strength when things are going right, but the lack of consistent role clarity could prove to be an issue should foul trouble or matchup issues present themselves.
Could They Upset a Top-2 Seed? Of course, they could. This team split their first 54 games this season before going on a five-week tear that saw them win 14 of 16 (wins over the Rockets, Pistons, Bucks, and Knicks twice). Consistency is a concern when looking at the big picture of what it takes to win a championship, but in any 48-minute sample or seven-game series, this team has the pieces to make life difficult for anyone.
Memphis Grizzlies
Path: Memphis opened as a six-point underdog for their date in Golden State with the Warriors on Tuesday night. Win that game, and they will travel to Houston as the West’s 7-seed. Should they fall, they will have to rebound, as a favorite, against the winner of Kings-Mavericks for the right to play the Thunder in the first round.
Why They Could Advance: Ja Morant’s celebrations have been stealing headlines, but how about the fact he’s had something to celebrate? He’s shooting over 40% from deep in April, a strong mark for anyone, let alone a player that was sub-26.5% in each of the three months prior. It’s a small sample, but if he at least has to be respected as a perimeter scorer, everything in the middle opens up in a meaningful way.
This isn’t the Grindhouse Grizz of the Zach Randolph days, but they’ve flirted with a top-10 efficiency rating on that side of the ball for the majority of the season, and given their emphasis on quantity when it comes to possessions, that might well prove to be enough.
Expectations need to be limited when a powerhouse lines up across from them, but in terms of the extensive middle class that populates the West, Memphis’ ceiling is an interesting one.
Why They Could Struggle: Memphis struggles in areas that are often highlighted this time of year — they struggle to pass (below average assist-to-turnover rate) and foul far too often (bottom-five in foul rate).
Can they overcome those flaws to win one of their next two games?
Sure.
Can they overcome them on a consistent enough basis to make noise at a high level?
I’m skeptical.
Could They Upset a Top-2 Seed? The pace in which they play can pose a problem for some teams in a single-game setting, but asking it to provide a sizable advantage over the course of a seven-game series is a step I’m not willing to take.
The loss of Jaylen Wells hurts what was an area of strength for this team in their depth and puts a lot of reliance on Jaren Jackson Jr. continuing to be the 40% 3-point shooter he’s been post-break.
Memphis hasn’t won much since the Super Bowl in terms of games against legitimate playoff teams, and that has me struggling to label them as a real threat to do it four times in two weeks.
Sacramento Kings
Path: The Sacramento Kings will host the Dallas Mavericks on Wednesday night, and if they survive that game as a five-point favorite, they will face the loser of Tuesday’s Warriors-Grizzlies game for the right to face the Thunder in the first round.
Why They Could Advance: The NBA is as talent-rich as it’s ever been, and in a situation where you’re only asked to win two straight to advance, this Sacramento team could pull it off. For the season, they own the second-best transition defense, and if they can cut off your water in terms of easy buckets, that opens the door for Zach LaVine to have the takeover moments that we’ve seen him cash in on for spurts.
Can he do it over a long series against a title contender? I don’t think so, but for two games? Why not? We literally just saw him light two playoff teams on fire while playing on the road (80 points in 87 minutes on 15-of-22 shooting from deep against the Cavaliers and Pistons), and we have enough of a sample size to know that he can combust like that for small windows.
Why They Could Struggle: I don’t think this team is well-rounded enough on either side of the court to do serious damage, and the defensive floor is what scares me the most. No team this season has allowed opponents to score a higher percentage of their points from downtown, and in 2025, if you’re constantly giving up good looks from distance, you’re not long for the postseason.
The scoring upside isn’t what you want it to be given the scorers on this roster, and that has been magnified when facing the better defenses in the league down the stretch of this season. Recently, in a game against the Magic on March 29, the Kings never led and managed to shoot just 42% from the field.
This feels like a house of cards without a single spot of stability.
Could They Upset a Top-2 Seed? The De’Aaron Fox trade felt like a waving of the white flag in terms of competing at a high level this season. Sabonis is capable of leading an offense, but in the underdog role like what we are talking about, he’d have to truly take over in a way that I’m not sure he can.
The versatile center hasn’t seen his scoring role change over the past three seasons, and that leaves this team without a truly versatile weapon that I view as a requirement when it comes to hanging with the elites. If they advance and avoid the Thunder, I think they’ll be frisky for stretches of time, but I’m not sure I’d pick them to win multiple games (there were some positive late-season results, but I can’t overlook a loss in Washington where Jordan Poole scored 23 points on 14 shots and didn’t turn the ball over a single time).
Dallas Mavericks
Path: The Dallas Mavericks will take their 17-25 road record to Sacramento on Wednesday night, hoping to extend their season. If they can pull off that upset, they’ll be asked to do even better against the loser of Warriors-Grizzlies in order to earn the West’s eight-seed.
Why They Could Advance: Not surprisingly, as the Mavs have gotten healthy, their edge on the glass has returned and allows them to limit opponents to a single shot, a significant strength to have this time of year as the defensive intensity results in a decline in average shot quality.
Combine that trend with the spike potential of Spencer Dinwiddie (he sandwiched a 31-point game in late March with a pair of 12-assist games), assuming that the lingering knee injury isn’t prohibitive, and the single-game upside of this team is still there, even without Kyrie Irving.
Of course, there’s the other side to that coin where, down the stretch of the regular season, he played 62 minutes against the Clippers/Lakers and made two of 12 shots, and the team managed just 201 points. Swings like that scare me off in a series situation, but in needing two consecutive wins against non-elite competition — there’s certainly a path.
Why They Could Struggle: Months ago, with Irving and Dončić driving the bus, this offense had the potential to keep this team competitive on a nightly basis against anyone. We saw that during their playoff run last season, too, but that potential is now gone, and it would appear that Naji Marshall has forgotten how to shoot the ball with a 10+ percentage point drop in his 3PT% this year from a season ago when he was lights out with the New Orleans Pelicans.
The quality of shots is obviously lower now than when the season started, and I have my concerns in terms of quantity of attempts. Dallas, as a team, is nothing more than average in assist-to-turnover rate, an awfully poor season-long rank given that a large portion of that data set is impacted by players no longer on the roster.
Dallas wasn’t competitive during a recent swing against the Los Angeles teams (-69 points across three games), and I fear that we could see that as early as the play-in tournament in a deep Western Conference.
Could They Upset a Top-2 Seed? What a story this would be if they could. If Irving was leading this otherwise healthy roster, I think we could have an interesting conversation, but that’s not the world in which we live.
Defensive upside is great and more valuable now than in January, but without a consistent perimeter threat, this team isn’t positioned to really push either of the top-2 seeds this year.
Kyle Soppe’s Predictions and Betting Card
Hawks +5
This is a numbers game where I don’t have to pick a winner outright. The Magic are 7-12 ATS this season when favored by 4-8 points, while the Hawks are 14-9 ATS when catching that many points.
Asking a team that struggles to score to win by margin is always something I’m going to have a hard time in doing, but that’s not all. Atlanta is going to want to push tempo and if you think they’ll be even remotely successful in doing so, they position themselves well to make this a tight game late.
This season, if you remove, for my money, the worst team in the sport in the Wizards, Orlando is just 9-17 ATS against top-10 pace teams this year (and, no, that doesn’t include Sunday’s regular-season finale that had nothing on the line against these Hawks).
I tend to lean toward taking the points in these play-in situations that pair such similar resumes against one another and that impulse is only greater the lower the projected total gets.
Heat-Bulls Under 224
There aren’t many things we truly “know” when it comes to professional sports, but the Bulls jacking up triples is reasonably close to that tier these days. A year after ranking 28th in three-point rate, Chicago took math classes this past summer and has a different outlook on offense, launching 3s at the third highest rate, ranking alongside the Warriors and Cavaliers when looking at the other teams in the playoff mix (the Celtics are on their own level, but Chicago is certainly in the next tier with some dangerous squads).
Will those shots fall?
I’ve got my questions about the quality of looks they generate, as it often seems like they have a quota to hit and will stop at nothing to do so. Playing a well-schooled Miami defense is unlikely to help their quality of looks, something that we’ve seen all season long for teams like this when facing Spoelstra’s defense.
For the season, unders are 11-3 in Miami games where the opposition launches at least half of their shots from long distance, a distinct possibility in this game. That near 79% hit rate is one thing, but what if I told you one of those losses came on opening night and then in other two against the Suns?
That means that all other instances this season have cashed under tickets. We have a wide range of opponent quality in that sample (from the Celtics in December to the Wizards at the end of March), assuring us that the level of competition and/or game script isn’t the culprit of these totals.
I’m not confident that either of these teams reaches 115 points, and that puts us in a good position. Over the past two seasons, when these teams have met in this position, the point totals were 203 and 193 points. Yes, different rosters, I’ll grant you that, but the offensive floor on a quarter-by-quarter basis remains low for both of these teams (across those two games, there were a total of five instances in which a team failed to clear 20 points in a quarter) and if that shines through for stretches, we’ll be sitting pretty!
Warriors Under 119.5 Points
The Warriors are combustible on the offensive end of the floor, for better and for worse. I mentioned their tendencies to give away quarters at a time in terms of scoring, and while I think that’s less likely to happen against a team like the Grizzlies, who play with tremendous pace, I’m not sold that they are capable of cashing in on Memphis’ greatest weakness.
Ja Morant and company rank in the bottom third of the league in turnover rate, but Golden State ranks dead last in transition efficiency. That could flip in a hurry, but if this game follows the flow that oddsmakers are suggesting, I don’t expect them to try to force the issue off of mosques.
If that’s the case, we are talking about fewer possessions than most project and that paves the path for this ticket to cash. Memphis isn’t known for their defense, but the Warriors aren’t exactly a versatile bunch on the end of the floor, and there are individual defensive pieces on the opposing sideline that are plenty capable of putting their fingerprints on this game.