How important is home court during playoffs?

[Chieflion]

I always thought home court advantage was kind of overrated. Sure, it's great if youre invincible at home, but what team can claim that?

It's so easy to drop one home game in the playoffs, and as soon as you do that, the home court advantage that you spent all season working for has now shifted to pressure on you.

1985-1986 Celtics and 2008-2009 Cavaliers. The Celtics won the championship and you know what happened to the Cavs, they were face ed by Dwight Howard and the Orlando Magic which was a team that could have gotten the number 1 seed had Jameer Nelson stayed healthy all season.

[BG_Spurs_Fan]

It's so easy to drop one home game in the playoffs, and as soon as you do that, the home court advantage that you spent all season working for has now shifted to pressure on you.

Disagree. It's not just the home court advantage, it's also the seedings that matter and better record generally means better seeding.

Let's take the 2008 playoffs as an example - all teams in the West were stacked by the end of the season, a couple of games could make huge difference in the seedings. We finished 3rd, Lakers were 1st. They had a cakewalk to the Western Finals - 4:0 against Denver and 4:1 against Utah,while we had grueling series against Phoenix and NO. So, by the time we met them we were tired and injured, while LA were rested and ready for it AND had the home court advantage, which was very important in the series. It turned out that the better seeding and the better record were a huge difference, despite the fact that seemingly a lot of teams were evenly good.

During our 4 le runs, the Spurs had HCA in all but 2 of the series, including in all 4 finals. HCA is even more important in the Finals,because of the format, as stats prove. For the past 20 years how many teams have won the le, while not having HCA? I can only think of Houston in 1995 ( damn them bas s! ).

Of course health is more important, but to dismiss the record and HCA as insignificant in a le run, is going against serious odds and against history.

[nkdlunch]

at this point, the Spurs need to worry about making the playoffs, playing as a team and staying healthy. home court is the last of the worries.

[Whisky Dog]

Home court adv isn't much, getting a top seed and getting a weaker 1st round opp is what's important. Need an easy 1st round.

[easjer]

Disagree. It's not just the home court advantage, it's also the seedings that matter and better record generally means better seeding.

The problem with this theory is that it assumes that seeding is an accurate reflection of differences between teams; it assumes that a first seeded team is necessarily better than an eighth seeded team.

But that is not necessarily so, especially these days in the West. For instance, regardless of record, the division winner will take no lower than the fourth slot, even if they would otherwise be ranked seventh or eighth (or possibly not even make the playoffs in truly awful divisions). Last year there were only a handful of games separating first from ninth (or out of the playoffs completely). It was changing daily and was tight until the end of the regular season.

It could be argued that the Spurs might have advanced if the finals games had caused seeding differences and they drew a different team. If you'll recall, there was a three way split going into a game that decided whether or not the Spurs would take the third seed or the sixth seed.

The ideal seed is great, but you can't control that anyway. And lower seeds certainly beat higher seeds. The point is that you can't sacrifice health and team unity for better placement, especially in freaking NOVEMBER, because it won't matter in the end where you are placed if you can't play to your best ability. Landing the three slot last year meant for the Spurs because they weren't healthy and weren't capable of competing. Not having home-court against the Suns in '05 didn't matter because they were the superior team.

[fmedrano1977]

Home court, though nice, it's really more important to a young team than it is to a seasoned vet team like the Spurs.

[Bukefal]

It is, not the most important, but it is important, because playing at home gives you that extra touch of motivation you need to win a game.

[YoMamaIsCallin]

Home court is not all that important. In fact it can be argued that starting on the road may be better for a team that has it's stuff together and is mature and workmanlike. (Like the Spurs). Why? Because all the pressure is on the home team to win the first 2 games.

If the visitors "steal" one game, especially if it's Game 1, then they immediately gain a huge advantage. They've turned HCA around so that they can win it on their homecourt in Game 6. Plus they've shown that they can beat the other team in their house.

Furthermore, if a low seed team beats a high seed team in the first round, they essentially take over the high seed spot too! For example if a 7 beats a 2, they get to play the 3 seed in the 2nd round. So this is a really good way for a team who's underperformed in the regular season to essentially steal a much better seed than they deserve. (Some leagues reseed after each round, or have byes and wild cards, to avoid this glitch in the system, but not the NBA.)

The reason this doesn't happen all that often is that the seedings usually reflect how good the teams actually are. So the home team is usually the better team. But, if you have a team that's started slow due to injuries or team chemistry or whatever, then picks up steam in the playoffs, it can be very good to start from a low seed.

[quentin_compson]

The problem with this theory is that it assumes that seeding is an accurate reflection of differences between teams; it assumes that a first seeded team is necessarily better than an eighth seeded team.

But that is not necessarily so, especially these days in the West. For instance, regardless of record, the division winner will take no lower than the fourth slot, even if they would otherwise be ranked seventh or eighth (or possibly not even make the playoffs in truly awful divisions). Last year there were only a handful of games separating first from ninth (or out of the playoffs completely). It was changing daily and was tight until the end of the regular season.

True, but seeding is irrelevant when it comes to HCA, as it is decided by the record.

[Capt Bringdown]

During our 4 le runs, the Spurs had HCA in all but 2 of the series, including in all 4 finals. HCA is even more important in the Finals,because of the format, as stats prove. For the past 20 years how many teams have won the le, while not having HCA? I can only think of Houston in 1995 ( damn them bas s! ).

Of course health is more important, but to dismiss the record and HCA as insignificant in a le run, is going against serious odds and against history.

You nailed it. Those are the facts, to suggest otherwise seems like little else than deluded fanboy wishful thinking.
Champions fight hard for HCA because they know how absolutely essential it is to winning a le.