The Ideal First-Round Playoff Matchups


Matthew Roberson | @mroberson22

The first round of the NBA playoffs elicits a weird sort of cognitive dissonance. Anyone who religiously watches the slew of mid-April games unquestionably loves basketball. But when you love something, is it best to have a lot of it, or do you love it because it only comes around every so often? Sure, you love watching the elite teams go at it, but do you really want to do it every day for six hours? The best nights of regular season NBA-watching typically feature two or three great games. The first round of the playoffs has the power to do that every night.

Is that really what we want, though? Even for the most diehard hoop heads, it’s easy to become exhausted by the sheer volume of first-round games. While the opening round provides the greatest amount of basketball, it’s also the most forgettable part of the playoffs. I bet you already forgot who the Cavs played in the first round last year, or that the Bulls were the eighth seed, and actually won two games thanks to Rajon Rondo, Dwyane Wade, and Paul Zipser.

Knowing that the first round tends to blur together into one indiscernible slog, it’s best to have the initial stage of the playoffs serve as an appetizer handpicked to set up the main course. Ideally, you have eight unique series, full of charming narratives and evenly-matched teams. You want the perfect storm of drama and excitement while not overshadowing the late rounds. With that in mind, here are eight first-round matchups that are both plausible and fun as hell.

Western Conference

(1) Houston Rockets vs. (8) Los Angeles Clippers

You may need a bib to watch this series. It’s going to be messy.

There is an entire menu of juicy, savory storylines to get into here. Chris Paul squaring off against his old team. The possibility of players throwing hands in secret arena passageways. Patrick Beverley maybe having a chance to play? Doc Rivers facing the team that ended his most promising Clipper playoff run. Wesley Johnson having to re-live the most traumatic moment of his basketball life. Playoff Lou Williams. Joe Johnson getting another crack at the Clippers. Boban.

And, of course, this.




The Rockets have been an unstoppable force all season. The Clippers, frankly, should be happy just to be included. Los Angeles is in the thick of the playoff race despite losing the franchise’s all-time best player before the season, as well as their best shooter, best bench scorer, and best wing defender. They started the season 8-15 – a stretch that included a nine-game losing streak – and traded the face of the franchise midway through the year. A barrage of injuries, including a supposed season-ender for their starting point guard, could have sunk the Clips into the lottery. Even with all that, and Avery Bradley missing the last 14 games, the Clippers have managed to stay afloat.

The contributions of Jawun Evans and Sindarius Thornwell, two rookie guards taken in the second round, cannot be overlooked. Both Beverley and Taken villain Milos Teodosic have missed extended time this season, forcing Doc and the Clippers to scrounge for competent guard play. Evans and Thornwell, in addition to C.J. Williams and Tyrone Wallace (playing on two-way contracts), are the unsung heroes of a team that is improbably seventh in the league in offensive rating.

If the Clippers crash the playoffs, and boy I hope they do, prepare yourself for a likely sweep that could make up for its lack of basketball intrigue with a whole bunch of side eyes and press conference burns. The Clippers may even find a tunnel that leads to a few wins, and we’d all be better for it. The longer this hypothetical series goes, the more chances for hypothetical NBA Twitter fire.

(2) Golden State Warriors vs. (7) Oklahoma City Thunder

Photo courtesy of Flavio Dilascio/Twitter


The first round of the playoffs is always like a cross-country road trip. You fall in love with the openness of it, each bend and twist offering a new, endless adventure. Knowing how vast it all is, and where the journey can take you, is the perfect cocktail of freedom and wanderlust. You can go from Oklahoma to Oakland if you want. The only thing stopping you is society’s stilted view of nomadism and the façade of loyalty. You can, and should explore everywhere, especially if it’s a better basketball situation.

Then, you get several hours in and realize there might be too much. It starts to get overwhelming. You’re oversaturated with things and places and possibilities. You get bored of sitting. Seeing everything be new and unfamiliar reminds you that it’s nice to have things that are old and familiar.

Then you start to remember that time in 2016 when Klay Thompson became a warlock for a night. You liked that. You want that to happen again. You want to see your old friends, even if you’re mad at them. You want to pull into your driveway, walk into the house, and see the Warriors playing the Thunder in the playoffs.

(3) Portland Trail Blazers vs. (6) Minnesota Timberwolves

The Blazers have clearly decided that they don't fuck with losing anymore, and the shorter this series is, the lower the chances of Thibs rushing Jimmy Butler back to action. Let’s keep it moving.

(4) New Orleans Pelicans vs. (5) Denver Nuggets

Right now, the Nuggets are in ninth place with 11 games to go. Normally, this would be a non-starter for playoff conversations. It’s 2018 though, and the world is a different place.

Tenth in the West right now means being two games behind the eighth seed in the loss column, and also three games behind the fourth seed in the loss column. A modest winning streak or even a fortuitous bounce could drastically change everything. Denver’s remaining schedule is a mine field – the team is currently on a seven-game road trip that features four time zone changes – and they’re coming off a humiliating loss in Memphis plus a double-overtime marathon in Miami. Losing to the Grizzlies right now is like getting a lower test score than the kid who knows they’re dropping out at the end of the semester. They aren’t even trying, dude.

With that said, if the Nugs can navigate this treacherous land leading to the playoffs, they’ll be in good shape. Denver would be hot just in time for the postseason, and they’d be battle tested. Each of the Nuggets’ last 10 games are with teams that are either in the playoffs or fighting for a spot. Surviving that stretch and securing a playoff spot would be tremendous validation for a franchise that’s missed the last four postseasons. It could also mean Anthony Davis vs. Nikola Jokic, and a clash of two teams that rank 15th or worse in defensive efficiency. That sounds fun.

Photo courtesy of @theScoreNBA

The last and only time we saw Davis in the playoffs, he shot 54 percent from the field and averaged 31.5 points, 11 rebounds, and three blocks per game. That was as a 21-year-old, against the eventual champions. Denver getting in would be the playoff debuts for Jokic, Jamal Murray, and Gary Harris. New Orleans getting in would be much-deserved returns to the playoffs for Jrue Holiday and Emeka Okafor. Both have gone through some extreme hardships, both basketball and non-basketball related. What’s not to love?

Eastern Conference

(1) Toronto Raptors vs. (8) Miami Heat

Barring extinction, the Raptors are locked in to the No. 1 seed. The Heat, six games clear of the ninth-place Pistons, are going to finish in the top eight. While Miami could certainly wiggle its way up to a higher seed, the odds of this series actually coming to fruition are very high.

Toronto has famously struggled in the first round during each of the Lowry-DeRozan playoff years; losing Game 1 of the opening round is now a full-blown Canadian tradition. The Raptors have had homecourt advantage in the first round for four straight years. Of those four series, Toronto lost two of them, and needed at least six games to win the other two. In 2016, after squeaking past the Pacers, the second-seeded Raptors had to scratch and claw to dispose of the Heat. A Heat team, mind you, that started rookie Justise Winslow at center in Game 7 after losing Hassan Whiteside to injury. Miami has experienced drastic roster overhaul since then, and the Raptors re-invented themselves as a modern team after years of prehistoric strategies. However, it is worth noting that the 2016 showdown featured three overtime games. While it would be incredibly heartwarming to see Toronto exorcise its demons and enjoy a stress-free first round series, there’d also be some perverse joy in watching them sweat it out again.

Also, a Toronto-Miami pairing would pit two teams with a wardrobe of excellent jerseys against each other, and force Drake to choose between his hometown and his “I’m giving a bunch of money to you guys” town. Most importantly, it’d give this tweet another chance to make its way around the internet.


(2) Boston Celtics vs. (7) Washington Wizards

BEEEEEEEEF! Let’s give you a refresher course on the Celtics-Wizards bad blood.

Last year, Jae Crowder booped John Wall on the nose, so Wall slapped him. As the NBA rule book clearly states, any middle school-level “fight” means that somebody has died. As such, the Wiz showed up for the teams’ next game in all black, declaring it a funeral. Washington won that game by 15, which makes sense because they were playing dead people? I don’t know. If it was a funeral, that means the Celtics were already deceased, right? Unless the Wizards think a funeral is where you show up somewhere to fight some alive people and murder them during the process. Both scenarios seem possible.

Anyway, the Celtics and Wizards met in last year’s playoffs, because the basketball gods are petty like that. That series will be remembered by historians for the best Kelly vs. Kelly fight to happen outside a sorority house. In the final and decisive game of that second-round bloodbath, Kelly Olynyk scored 26 points off the bench, while Kelly Oubre played a grand total of six seconds. Olynyk has moved on from Boston, but he’ll always have the upper hand over his younger, swaggier namesake.

If the Celtics and Wizards cross paths again in this year’s playoffs, not only would it be a rematch of one of last year’s best series, between two teams that truly do not like each other, it’d also mean a Morris twin faceoff. Think of it like the Spiderman pointing meme, except it’s two dudes named Marcus and Markieff.

(3) Indiana Pacers vs. (6) Milwaukee Bucks

The Pacers are the most boring team in this year’s playoff field. Let’s punch up their first-round series by adding a heavy dose of Giannis.

(4) Cleveland Cavaliers vs. (5) Philadelphia 76ers
Photo courtesy of Joel Embiid/Instagram


I don’t think it’s hyperbolic to say that this would be my favorite first-round series ever. What better way to indoctrinate Ben Simmons and Joel Embiid to playoff basketball than a set of games against their generation’s MJ? Some people said before the season that Philly would get swept like bread crumbs if they met Cleveland in the playoffs. That was before we knew that Isaiah Thomas was washed and the Simmons-Embiid duo was the real deal.

To be clear, Philadelphia winning this series would still be a massive upset. Remember, LeBron has never lost in the first round. He’s also never played T.J. McConnell in the first round. If nothing else, this series could finally provide some closure to the debate over whether LeBron or T.J. is really the GOAT.

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