How Are The NBA Playoffs Structured?
The NBA playoffs are a best-of-seven elimination tournament annually held after the NBA’s regular season to determine the league’s champion.
Introduction
The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional men’s basketball league in North America, composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada). It is one of the four major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada, and is widely considered to be the premier men’s professional basketball league in the world.
The NBA playoffs are a best-of-seven elimination tournament annually held after the NBA’s regular season to determine the league’s champion. The playoffs were first introduced in 1947, following a merger between the Basketball Association of America (BAA) and the National Basketball League (NBL). Initially, eight teams qualified for the playoffs: five from each division, and three wild card teams. From 1950 until 1970 only four teams qualified for the playoffs: two from each division, regardless of whether their records were above or below .500. In order to bulwark flagging ratings during this period—a time when professional basketball was still searching for mainstream popularity—the League expanded its playoff qualifying rules several times. By 1975, ten teams had advanced to the tournament proper; by 1980 that number had grown to twelve.
The NBA uses a pre-determined playoff bracket system to determine which team from each conference will face each other during any particular round. Conference seeds are disregarded for purposes of determining matchups; instead, matchups are determined strictly by regular season record regardless of whether a team finished first or eighth in its conference.
The Regular Season
The NBA regular season is when all 30 teams in the league play 82 games each. These games are spread out over a six-month period from October to April. At the end of the regular season, the team with the best record in each conference is crowned the conference champion. The conference champions then advance to the NBA Finals to determine the league champion.
The playoffs are a single-elimination tournament that features 16 teams, eight from each conference. The first round of the playoffs is known as the “first four”, because it features the four lowest-seeded teams from each conference playing against each other in two games. The winners of these two games advance to the first round of the playoffs proper, where they take on the first and second seeds from their respective conferences.
The first round of the playoffs is a best-of-seven series, meaning that the team with the better record must win four games before the other team can win three. The second round is also a best-of-seven series, but this time it features the winners of the first round matchup between the first and second seeds andthe winners ofthefirstroundmatchupbetweenthe thirdandfourthseeds. Thethirdroundoftheplayoffsistheconference Finals, which is also a best-of-seven series that determines which team from each conference will advance totheNBA Finals.
The NBA Finals is a best-of-seven series between the conference champions that determines who will be crowned league champion for that season.
The Playoffs
The National Basketball Association (NBA) playoffs are a best-of-seven elimination tournament annually held after the NBA’s regular season to determine the league’s champion. The losers of the first-round series as well as the four remaining teams from the second round onward from each conference compete in the NBA playoffs. bracket.
The Finals
The NBA Finals is the championship series of the National Basketball Association (NBA). The Eastern and Western conference champions play a best-of-seven game series to determine the league champion. The winning team of the series receives the Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy.
Conclusion
The NBA playoffs are a best-of-seven elimination tournament annually held after the NBA’s regular season to determine the league’s champion. For 2017, the playoffs began on April 15, and ended on June 12, with the Golden State Warriors winning their fifth championship in franchise history.
