How Many Games In The NBA Season?
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The NBA season is 82 games long. Each team plays 41 home games and 41 away games.
82
That is the amount of games in an NBA season
An NBA season consists of 82 games. There are 29 teams in the NBA as of the 2020-2021 season. 82 games divided by 29 teams equals 2.86 games per team per week.
Playoffs
The NBA regular season is 82 games long, but how many games are in the NBA playoffs? The answer may surprise you. The NBA playoffs are a tournament consisting of four rounds of best-of-seven series. The first two rounds are played within the conference, with the higher seed having home-court advantage. The winners of those series advance to the conference finals, where the two remaining teams battle it out for a spot in the NBA Finals.
16 teams make the playoffs
16 teams make the playoffs. 8 from each conference. The conference finals are a best of 7 and the NBA Finals are a best of 7.
8 from the Western Conference and 8 from the Eastern Conference
The NBA playoffs are a best-of-seven elimination tournament annually held after the National Basketball Association’s (NBA) regular season to determine the league’s champion. Eight teams from each of the league’s two conferences qualify for the playoffs.
From 1949 to 1970, only four teams from each conference qualified for the tournament. In 1971, five teams from each conference qualified for the tournament. From 1985 to 2015, eight teams (three division winners and five wild card qualifiers) from each conference qualified for the tournament. In 2016, lower seeds became more advantageous with the playoff format changing to a four-round best-of-seven series in every round; this necessitated an additional playoff game between two lower seeds in each conference that did not have byes for that round.
The four division winners are seeded 1–4 based on their regular season record, while the five wild card teams are seeded 5–9. The NBA did not institute this seeding arrangement until 1984, when it also increased the regular season to an 82-game schedule; prior to that, most seasons were between 60 and 70 games with playoff berths determined by winning percentage instead of win–loss record. Consequently, divisional and conference standings were ignored.
From 1951 to 1970 inclusive, 10 teams in each conference qualified for the playoffs regardless of record; otherwise, only 8 teams made it into each conference’s playoffs.
Finals
The Finals is a best of 7 series
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 winner of the NBA Finals receives the Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy, which replaced the Walter A. Brown Trophy in 1983.
The series was initially known as the BAA Finals prior to the 1949–50 season when the Basketball Association of America (BAA) merged with the National Basketball League (NBL) to form the NBA. The competition oversaw further name changes to NBA World Championship Series from 1950 to 1985, as well as a brief stint as the Showdown of Champions in 1986. Following 1986, it reverted to NBA World Championship Series until 2014, before finally settling on NBA Finals in 2015.
The team with the better record gets home court advantage
In the NBA, the team with the better record gets home court advantage. The first team to win four games in a best-of-seven series advances to the next round and the losing team is eliminated. In each series, the team with home court advantage starts the series by playing two games at home, then three on the road. If necessary, Games 5-7 are played in a 2-2-1-1-1 format, meaning that Games 1, 2, 5 and 7 are played at the home of the team with home court advantage while Games 3 and 6 are played at the home of the other team.
The NBA Finals is a best-of-seven series between the winners of each conference’s playoff. The Eastern Conference champion plays against the Western Conference champion in order to decide who will hoist theLarry O’Brien Championship Trophy.