Perry Bible Fellowship | Main | Maps of religous geographical concentration

April 19, 2006

What happens if an NBA basketball game ends tied 0-0?

It is a pretty common thing that a team at the end of a season has an interest in losing games, to get a better match-up or to move up in the college draft (as worse teams get better picks). The situation with the game last night between Memphis and the LA Clippers in the NBA, however, was the very most extreme case of this I have ever seen. Facts to consider:

1) Winner of the game would get the 5th seed and loser the 6th seed in the playoffs (very rare that the two teams involved in this kind of thing are competing head to head in the final game in this way).

2) 5th seed (game winner) plays the very good 4th seeded Dallas Mavericks (60 and 21 record which is 3rd best overall in the entire NBA but are only 4th seed in the West because Division Winners get higher seeds).

3) 6th seed (game loser) plays the very weak 3rd seeded Denver Nuggets (44 and 37 record) and amazingly even gets home court advantage in the 1st round because although Denver as a division winner gets boosted to 3rd seed, home court is based on the better record of the two teams playing and Denver's is worse than both Memphis and LA's.

4) If the 6th seed (game loser) team wins in the 1st round, they only have to play the 2seed-7seed game winner (prob Phoenix at 53 and 28) in the 2nd round and not the 1seed-8seed winner (probably San Antionio at 62 and 19).

It is my opinion that all of these things combine to MASSIVELY increase the team's chances of advancing by losing the game last night (probably at least like doubling their chances and an even bigger multiple as far as getting to the finals).

Apparently both teams actually played to win (and Memphis did) but I just find this incredible given the situation!!! What could the NBA do to them if they felt they weren't trying to win? In the most extreme case, if both teams refused to put a single shot through the basket, what would happen? Are you allowed to score for the other team? One would think this kind of thing would piss off the fans but the novelty factor of both teams doing absolutely EVERYTHING to lose would probably have been hillarious. Can you get all of your players ejected from the game and thus forfeit? Do you keep playing when left with only 4 players if doing this plan? Is there a rule to cover a 0-0 score after N overtimes?

Posted by aarondf at April 19, 2006 01:53 PM

Comments

Post a comment