With the inaugural Mid-Season Tournament this season, it’s important to know how the tournament works and how each team will be affected. Here’s a look at how the Mid-Season Tournament will work and how it looks for the Cavs.
Teams were randomly sorted into groups within their own conference based on last season’s standings. This was through a “pot” system in which the top three teams from last season in each respective conference were placed into a group. Then the fourth through sixth teams in a group, and so on until the groups were sorted into five groups called “pots.” A team from each pot was randomly selected and placed into the groups within each conference.
A: Memphis, Phoenix, Los Angeles (Lakers), Utah and Portland.
B: Denver, Los Angeles (Clippers), New Orleans, Dallas and Houston.
C: Sacramento, Golden State, Minnesota, Oklahoma City and San Antonio.
A: Philadelphia, Cleveland, Atlanta, Indiana and Detroit.
B: Milwaukee, New York, Miami, Washington and Charlotte.
C: Boston, Brooklyn, Toronto, Chicago and Orlando.
Starting on November 3 teams will play games on predetermined “Tournament Nights.” Each team will play one game against each other team in their group (totaling 4 games) across the month of November. Each team will play two of these games at home and two of these games away.
Eight teams will advance to the single-game elimination tournament in December. The eight teams are the best teams in each group along with two wild cards. The wild cards will be the second-place teams of the top two groups. The first round will take place on December 4-5 and the championship game will be on December 9.
The games played in both the Tournament Nights and the tournament itself will count towards the regular season. This is excluding the championship game which will not count towards the regular season schedule or statistics.
The 22 teams that did not make the tournament will continue with regular season play during this time.
Teams will receive an allocation of money from the prize pool, with the championship team getting the largest, then the other team that made the tournament finals, then the teams that made the quarter-finals and finally the teams eliminated at the start receiving the smallest share. The winning team will also receive the new NBA Cup trophy.
Players who participate in the tournament will also be eligible for All-Tournament teams as well as tournament MVP.
Cleveland’s Tournament Night games will take place on November 3 at Indiana, November 17 versus Detroit, November 21 at Philadelphia and November 28 versus Atlanta.
Detroit and Atlanta should be the easier of the games, with Philadelphia going into the season as one of the favorites to come out of the East (granted Harden isn’t traded) and Cleveland always seeming to struggle to play the Pacers in Indy. Considering each team will only be played once, however, anything could happen. Hopefully, fortune favors the Cavs.
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Featured photo courtesy of NBA.com
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