The Cavaliers will have home-court advantage throughout the Eastern Conference playoffs.
It took an extra game than expected, but the Cleveland Cavaliers finally did. Their 135-113 win over the Chicago Bulls locked them into the top spot in the Eastern Conference over the Boston Celtics.
This is the fourth time the Cavs have finished the regular season with the best record in the East. The other three teams were the 2008-09, 2009-10, and 2015-16 Cavaliers. The 2016 team was the only one of that group that made it to or won the NBA Finals.
The Cavs have already secured their second-most wins in franchise history and still have a chance of tying the 2008-09 team’s 66 wins for the top spot in team history. To do that, they’d have to win their final three games.
This team will be judged on whether or not they can continue this success in the postseason. But that doesn’t take away from just how dominant the Cavs have been for the last five-and-a-half months. This level of dominance was only matched or surpassed by one of the 11 LeBron James-led regular-season Cavaliers teams. That’s an impressive accomplishment.
We won’t know who the Cavaliers will play in the first round of the playoffs quite yet. That won’t be decided until Friday, April 8.
They will play the winner of the game between the winner of the nine and 10-seed game and the loser of the seven and eight-seed game. These are the teams currently in those positions: Orlando Magic (seven), Atlanta Hawks (eight), Chicago Bulls (nine), and Miami Heat (10).