HOUSTON -- The two best teams in the Western Conference are on course to meet in the second round of the playoffs, which is a problem.
Even David Stern recognizes as much, which is why his league is taking a closer look at changing the postseason seeding format to prevent similar scenarios from unfolding in the future.
Under rules implemented when the league expanded from four divisions to six last season, the top three seeds go to each of the division leaders, with the fourth through eighth seeds going to the teams with the next best records in the conference.
The Dallas Mavericks (41-11) currently lead the Southwest Division by one game over the San Antonio Spurs (40-12), who have the second-best record in the conference but would drop into the fourth seed if they failed to win the division.
"I think the one thing there may be some interest in ... would be to maybe look at how you seed the top four teams," deputy commissioner Russ Granik said Saturday. "One thing that we have kicked around is whether you might say, all right, those same four teams are going to get the top four seeds, but maybe you do it in accordance with their records."
The issue will come up for further discussion when the league's competition committee meets in June.
Granik all but ruled out giving playoff berths to the top eight teams in each conference, saying the league wanted to keep an incentive for winning the division. He also said the league has no interest in re-seeding teams after each round of the playoffs.
i guess this is more fair.. so sucky teams won't be auto-locked at 3rd place while the loser of the mavs-spurs division won't be stuck at 4th..
u just wait
