Over the course of the NBA season, Sports Club Stats has tracked each team’s playoff chances as they’ve developed throughout the year, and as you might expect, the Nets have had two very different trendlines: looking straight down during 2013, then nothing but up in 2014.
Here’s how Sports Club Stats figures out the odds, from their website:
It knows the season schedule and scores for past games. As games are played it grabs the new scores from the internet (or gets scores sent in from fans) and simulates the rest of the season by randomly picking scores for each remaining game. The weighted method takes the opponents record and home field advantage into account when randomly picking scores, so the better team is more likely to win. The 50/50 method gives each opponent an equal chance of winning (or tying if the sport allows it) each game. When it’s finished “playing” all the remaining games it applies the league’s tie breaking rules to see where everyone finished. It repeats this random playing out of the season million of times, keeping track of how many “seasons” each team finishes where. Finally it updates the site with the new results for you to read with your morning coffee.
You can go directly to the website’s full chart and hover over each day of the year to see their chances develop throughout the season.
Some dates of note include:
December 5th — This was their lowest point of the season: after losing to the New York Knicks 113-83 and falling to 5-14 on the season, the Nets had just a 3.97% chance of making the playoffs, or under 1 in 25.
December 31st — After their loss to the San Antonio Spurs on December 31st, the Nets had just a 4.99% chance of making the playoffs, or about 1 in 20. Would’ve been a nice day to place a bet.
January 26th — Less than four weeks later, the Nets climbed from 4.99% to 87.42% after their 85-79 victory over the Boston Celtics.
February 27th — After their blowout win against the Denver Nuggets, the Nets had a 95% chance or above at making the playoffs every day of the rest of the season.
April 1 — The Nets officially clinched the playoffs on April Fool’s. Happy birthday, Brook Lopez.
Check out the full chart below.
