East vs West

[Matt]

OK, it just hit me. After NOH move to the West the East will be further depleted. ATM there are ONLY 4 teams that stand a chance, slim as it may be, against a Western Co team......those being: New Jersey, NOH, Indiana and Detroit. Make that 3 next season. Not only does the East lose a contender (which is good if your a NJ, Indiana or Detroit fan) but we also lose a great PG in aron Davis. He's back to full strength now and not bothered by injuries and he's tearing it up, MVP? Possibly, be he's deffinately a huge loss to the East.
The East seems to have a reputation for having better guards than West, and West better big men than East. Seems as though West will have both now. Take a look at the top PG's in the West next year at this very point in time........Payton, Parker, Francis, A Miller, S Nash, S Cassell, J Williams, S Marbury, M Bibby and B Jackson, Nick Van Exel and of course B Davis That's 12 quality PG's on 15 teams......the ones excluded are D Stoudamire (decent), Carlos Arroyo (upcoming talent) and whoever the Clipps have playing at the point. Now the East......... G Arenas, J Kidd, L James (if he remains PG), C Billups. That's only 4 guys. E Snow is mostly defensive minded, TJ Ford will be on that list soon as will Dwayne Wade, A Williams is playing badly ATM and theres not much else.
Lets take a look at the top SG's in the West.........Finley, Sprewell, 'Flip'(if his play continues) and Ray Allen, Kobe, and maybe Bonzi Wells. M Harpring and C Mobley are close but not quite their yet. The East has......T-Mac, A Houston, E Jones, J Stackhouse, PP34, AI, J Terry, RIP Hamilton, M Redd and VC with considerations to L Hughes, R Davis. This time East wins 10-5. So the overall score for guards is East 14- West 17 but everything seems to be going to the west.
Anyways, keeping on East vs West let me take you back to 95-96. The East had 9 teams with a record of .500% and the West 7. In that season there were 7 teams to win 50+ games (how many last season??). Wests 8th seed (Sac 39-43) would be either 10th or 11th (decided by head to head record vs Was who had same record). Thats seems kind of like the situation we have now, but reversed. Not quite. Of the 7 teams to win 50+ games 4 were from the West, SAS (59), Utah (55), Seattle (64) and LAL (53) thus giving the East real good competition. The East top teams were Chicago (72), Orlando (60) and even though Indiana won 52 games they can't be classified as contenders since there is a 20 game win gap b/w them and the Bulls.
Oh well, those are just some thoughts..............here are the standings for 95-96

Atlantic
Orlando 60-22
NYK 47-35
Miami 42-40
Was. 39-43
Boston 33-49
NJN 30-52
Philly 18-64

Central
Chicago 72-10
Indiana 52-30
Cleveland 47-35 (yes they were good once)
Atlanta 46-36
Detroit 46-36
Charlotte 41-41
Milwaukee 25-47
Toronto 21-61

Midwest
SAS 59-23
Utah 55-27
Houston 48-34
Denver 35-47
Dallas 26-56
Minnesota 26-56
Vancouver 15-67

Pacific
Seattle 64-18
LAL 53-29
Portland 44-38
Phoenix 41-41
Sac To 39-43
GSW 36-36
LAC 29-53


Sorry bout the long post........i'm on holidays and I have plenty of time to spare

[Shep]

if you take the bulls out of the '90's, the west wins every championship since detroit

[Jackal]

if you take the bulls out of the '90's, the west wins every championship since detroit

Yeps, Spurs-Lakers-Lakers-Lakers-Spurs.

I think west will win it all this year too, Spurs, Lakers and Dallas/T-Wolves, one of these teams will win it I think.

[Shep]

Yeps, Spurs-Lakers-Lakers-Lakers-Spurs

what?

[paul_pierce_the_truth]

if you take the bulls out of the '90's, the west wins every championship since detroit

What the heck, the Bulls won 6 times????
It's like saying if you took the NY Yankees out of baseball, the Dodgers are the best or something.

If you took the Celtics out of the 60s, the 76ers rule.

This type of logic is scaring me.

[Shep]

tell me what east team ,if there was no chicago, would win the championship in the '90's.....then i'll laugh at you

[scubilete]

lol, well, the only team I see with the possibilities in the east to win if there were no Bulls in the 90s, it's the 92-93 Knicks and they would be facing the Suns so it would be still a tough choice.

[paul_pierce_the_truth]

tell me what east team ,if there was no chicago, would win the championship in the '90's.....then i'll laugh at you

You are trying to say the West was stronger than East during the 90s, except for the Bulls?

Well first of all the West was not stronger than the East because they only won 3 titles and the East won 7. (Detroit 1990, Chicago 1991-93, 96-98, Houston 1994-95, San Antonio 1999)

In 1991 the Lakers yeeked out game one of the Finals then got swept for 3 in a row, including two at home, the Bulls swept the 2-time NBA Champions Detroit that year, the Pistons had proven to the Lakers that they could beat them, so I believe Detroit could have won the championship in 1991 over the Lakers.

If the Blazers or Suns played that very tough Knicks team in 1992 or 1993 would they beat them? (as stated above)

Could the Blazers beat Cleveland in 1992, Blazers won 2 games, Cavs won 2 games vs. Bulls, Knicks won 3. 1993 saw the Suns win 2 games and Knicks won 2 games vs. Chicago.

In 1996 I believe it comes down to match-ups, could Seattle match-up with Orlando or New York? Edge somehow to Seattle by wnning two games vs. Chicago. But I would like to have seen Orlando and Shaq against Seattle.

1997 I might begin to believe this theory, Miami reached the East Finals, compared to Utah vs. Houston in the West.

In 1998 the Pacers pushed the Bulls to the limit, winning 3 games in the East Finals, while Utah managed 2 wins and this:
June 7: Sun., Utah *54 at Chicago 96.

So in 1994, 1995 and 1999 the West won.

1994 saw Houston lose 3 games to the Knicks.
No other Champion needed 7 games during the decade.

1995 sweeps abounded for the Rockets, finally a team you can hang your Western Conference hat on.

1999 San Antonio need only 5 games to dump the Knicks, and thus the West's stranglehold begins, in 1999, not before and not since 1980s was it even close.


Teams that reached the Finals and their records
Chicago 24-11 (6-0 in the Series)
Houston 8-3 (2-0)
Detroit 4-1 (1-0)
San Antonio 4-1 (1-0)
New York 4-8 (0-2)
Utah 4-8 (0-2)
Portland 3-8 (0-2)
Phoenix 2-4 (0-1)
Seattle 2-4 (0-1)
Lakers 1-4 (0-1)
Orlando 0-4 (0-1)

East 32-24 (7-3)
West 24-32 (3-7)


1990


1991, 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997 & 1998


1994 & 1995


1999

[GloveGuy]

I agree with paul_pierce_the_truth on this one. The East second best teams maybe could've beat the Western Champions. The Knicks gave the Bulls some problems, in a series that was looking to get ugly in '92. The Pacers-Bulls series in '98 was all about home court advantage. Each team won their games at home. The seventh game was in Chicago, which the Bulls pulled away with even though I remember the Pacers having the lead for some of that game too.

[Matt]

good points there............that Pacers team 98 was real tough for the Bulls
what was the season series between Pacers and Jazz that year??