The Los Angeles Lakers will play their 2021 playoff opener Sunday at Phoenix, seeking the first of 16 victories that would give them a second consecutive NBA championship and record-breaking 18th overall.
The return of LeBron James and Anthony Davis from injuries that sidelined them much of the second half of the season have made the seventh-seeded Lakers favored in the best-of-seven Western Conference first-round series over the second-seeded Suns despite not having the home-court advantage.
All but one of ESPN’s 18 NBA experts surveyed predicted the Lakers will win the series while the ABC News-owned data prediction website FiveThirtyEight gives the Lakers a 64% chance of winning.
The Suns had the NBA’s second-best record in the regular season, 51-21, two seasons after tying for the second-worse, 19-63.
“They’re the No. 2 in the league for a reason … because they’ve surrounded CP and Book with a supporting cast that’s been playing at a high level all year,” James said, referring 11-time all-star guard Chris Paul and guard Devin Booker, an all-star selection the past two seasons.
“They got a great Big 3 in CP, Book and (center Deandre) Ayton and the rest of those guys are stars in their roles. We’ve got to be able to understand that and match that.”
Paul is among nine Suns who were not with the team last season when it was 34-39 and missed making the playoffs on a tiebreaker.
Phoenix is the third team since the NBA-ABA merger in 1976 to have jumped from bottom two to top two in two seasons or less joining the 1979-80 Boston Celtics, who were 61-21 in Larry Bird’s first season with the team after going 29-53 the previous season, and the 2007-08 Celtics who were 66-16 after acquiring future Hall of Famers Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen following a 24-58 season.
The Lakers enter the playoffs with a six-game winning streak, including a 103-100 victory over the Golden State Warriors in a play-in game Wednesday that made them the seventh seed in the Western Conference.
The streak began with a 123-110 victory over Phoenix May 9, the Lakers’ lone victory over the Suns in the 2020-21 season after losing the first two games.
Davis did not play in either of the losses to the Suns because of a right calf strain while James missed the second because of a sprained right ankle.
The game at Phoenix Suns Arena is the Suns’ first playoff game since May 29, 2010, when they lost to the Lakers, 111-103 in Game 6 of the Western Conference finals.
Since the NBA playoffs expanded to 16 teams in 1984, the seventh-seeded team is 5-69 against the second-seeded team, with only one of the victories — San Antonio over Dallas in a 2010 Western Conference series — coming since the first-round was expanded to a best-of-seven series in 2003.
Teams winning Game 1 of a best-of-seven series go on to win the series 76.2% of the time, 425 of 558. Teams winning Game 1 at home win the series 85.2% of the time, 346 of 406. Teams winning Game 1 of a best-of-seven series on the road go on to win the series 52% of the time, 79 of 152.
James was found to be in breach of the NBA’s health and safety protocols this week but won’t be suspended because the outdoor promotional event Wednesday for a tequila brand he backs didn’t rise to a threat level of virus spread, ESPN reported.
“It’s a violation of the agreed-upon protocols, and, as we have in other comparable instances around the league, it has been addressed with the team,” a league spokesman told ESPN on Friday.
According to league protocols, players who fail to comply with rules are subject to warnings, fines or suspensions. Players who repeatedly break the rules could be subject to more severe discipline.