Football may be king on Thanksgiving weekend, but the 20-game mark serves as a useful checkpoint for NBA teams. Trends become part of a roster’s identity and statistical oddities are no longer outliers as everything begins to crystalize for players, teams and the league.
Here are 10 early-season story lines of the 2024–25 NBA campaign.
Celtics Running Smoothly With Another Level to Hit
The defending champion Boston Celtics picked up pretty much where they left off following last season’s dominant start-to-finish campaign. Coming off an NBA championship after a 64–18 regular season, the Celtics won 15 of their first 18 games—on pace to finish 68–14. Superstar wing duo Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown are putting up a combined 53.4 points, 14.8 rebounds and 10.2 assists per game. The offense leads the league in three-point makes per game (18.9), is ranked third in points per game (120.2) and is third in turnovers per game (11.4) through Tuesday. All is well in Boston.
And the Celtics still have another level to hit. Their biggest flaw has been protecting the paint; the team ranks 26th in paint points allowed per game. In welcoming back Kristaps Porzingis from injury on Monday, they immediately improved, blocking 11 shots in a 126–94 win over the Los Angeles Clippers.
The Celtics are already great and getting better—a disturbing sign for any team hoping to knock them off come the postseason.
76ers Veering Toward Disaster
Of all the surprising records, the Philadelphia 76ers checking in at 3–13 (14th in the Eastern Conference) has to be the biggest. The reason isn’t a mystery: The Sixers’ stars have not been available. Joel Embiid has played in four of the team’s opening 16 games. Paul George checks in at eight games played, and Tyrese Maxey at 10.
It was expected and even assumed that Philly’s Big Three would struggle to stay on the court, but all three dealing with injuries this early in the season has been close to the worst-case scenario. Per NBA.com’s lineup data, Embiid, George and Maxey have shared the court for six minutes through 16 games. Total!
There’s very little room for error for a Philadelphia squad with championship expectations. The Sixers will likely need to win around 65% of their remaining games to be in playoff contention. With how poorly Embiid has played in his few appearances and the deeply concerning injury history between him and George, there are many reasons to worry and few justifications for optimism.
The West Is Tough As Ever, the East … Not So Much
Speaking of the East … Even the most pessimistic projections couldn’t have anticipated only four teams entering Thanksgiving with a record comfortably above .500. The bottom of the conference is especially brutal, with three teams falling well short of even a 30% winning percentage.
The West, meanwhile, is maintaining its reputation as the tougher conference with ease. Only a few games separate first from sixth, and seed Nos. 7 to 13 are a jumble of squads with very similar win totals. Only two teams have failed to hit seven wins; there are four such teams in the East.
For years, the West has been competitive from the first seed down to the play-in tournament, while the East features two or three dominant squads with everybody else falling into the middling-to-tanking range. It appears that is not likely to change in 2024–25.
Stars Everywhere Are Battling Injuries
In perhaps a related point, there have been a disproportionate number of injuries to superstars. A shocking 16 players who were All-Stars last season have missed time already this season. Similarly big names Aaron Gordon, Chet Holmgren, Dejounte Murray, Bradley Beal and Victor Wembanyama have been or are currently sidelined. Nearly every contender is dealing with the absence of an important player. This rash of early-season injuries to some really fun players has watered down what has otherwise been tremendously high quality basketball.
Nikola Jokic Has Another MVP Campaign Loading
Three-time MVP Nikola Jokic, who recently returned to the Denver Nuggets after a three-game absence due to the birth of his son, is already running away with the NBA’s marquee award. Again.
Jokic somehow has been even better this season. He’s averaging a career high in points (29.7) and assists (10.9) per game, while leading the league with 13.6 rebounds per contest. He’s doing everything for a Nuggets team that can’t survive unless he does everything. Voter fatigue exists in MVP conversations, but Jokic could lead the league in points, assists and rebounds per game—an unthinkable feat for anybody, especially a center.
Jokic is hitting another level after cementing his place as one of the most prolific players in basketball history. Voters won’t tire if he continues on this track.
Everything Is Clicking for the Cavaliers
The Cleveland Cavaliers had high expectations entering this season. The team locked up its current core and replaced coach J.B. Bickerstaff with Kenny Atkinson. The pressure was on to prove this collection of talent, headlined by Donovan Mitchell and Evan Mobley, was a legitimate title contender.
It's safe to say the Cavs have easily blown those expectations out of the water. Just about everything is going right for Cleveland. The team ripped off a 15-game win streak to start the season, and the first loss came to Boston. Mobley looks ready to break out offensively, the bench (led by Ty Jerome) has been electric and they’ve found significant success even with a lot of injury problems on the wing. They’re rocking offensively, leading the NBA in points per game and field goals made per game. The Cavs already have 10 wins by double-digit points.
The hot shooting will eventually cool, but the Cavaliers have chemistry and a good mix of talent. It’s fun to watch a team in that kind of zone.
The Race for Cooper Flagg Will Be Tight
This season’s hot NBA draft prospect is Cooper Flagg, the Duke Blue Devils standout who projects to be the sort of do-everything, two-way wing who is the apple of any contender’s eye. The tanking race (nicknamed “Capture the Flagg”) has already begun.
The Washington Wizards (2–14) and Toronto Raptors (4–14) seem to be the top contenders in the East. In the West, only the Utah Jazz (4–13) appear ready to tank. But as the season goes on more could join them.
The Chicago Bulls (8–11) may move off Zach LaVine and/or Nikola Vucevic by the trade deadline. The banged-up Charlotte Hornets (6–11) are one more injury away from turning into a lottery team. The New Orleans Pelicans (4–14) are already so decimated by injuries, they could be better off packing it up for the season.
With a pretty loaded draft around Flagg, teams will be more eager to pull the plug on competitiveness than last season. So far, it’s a tight race to the bottom.
LeBron James Is Defying Father Time Yet Again
At this point perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised LeBron James continues to be one of the best players in basketball. Yet, we should never lose sight of just how remarkable it is.
A month before he turns 40 years old, James is averaging 23.3 points, 9.2 assists and 8.1 rebounds per game. He became the oldest player in NBA history to post three straight triple doubles, breaking his own record set in his age-34 season. Then he put up another and set a career record for most triple doubles in a row.
James’s athleticism may have waned and his efficiency has been decreasing for a few years, but there is still nothing he can’t do on the basketball court.
More Three-Point Shots Than Ever
Whether you think it is good or bad for the game of basketball, NBA teams are chucking from deep at a higher rate than ever. The league average of 37.4 attempts per game is an all-time record, and Yahoo Sports’s Tom Haberstroh found the increase of 2.4 attempts year-over-year is the largest one-year jump ever. Perhaps most astoundingly, the Celtics are on pace to shatter the all-time record for most three-point attempts per game by a single team. The 2018–19 Houston Rockets attempted 45 per contest. Boston is currently averaging 50.6 per game.
There is a chance the volume decreases as most teams realize that, unlike the Celtics, they do not employ eight good-to-great three-point shooters and would be better off finding high-percentage shots inside the arc. Or, maybe, this is how the game will continue to be played. Either way, this is a trend to keep an eye on as the season marches on.
Knicks, Timberwolves Still Adjusting After Identity-Altering Trades
By executing the training camp trade of Julius Randle for Karl-Anthony Towns, the New York Knicks and Minnesota Timberwolves changed their identities at a fundamental level. Minnesota has to learn how to operate without the space Towns’s shooting provided alongside Rudy Gobert. New York has to learn how to compensate for Towns’s defensive deficiencies and overall change the style of play to a five-out offense after a few years of cramped spacing.
So far the results have been middling for both teams: The Wolves are 8–9 and the Knicks are 10–7. New York boasts the second-best offensive net rating in the league but the seventh-worst defensive rating. Minnesota clocks in at a middling 11th and 13th, respectively. The swap clearly shook the foundation of both teams, and they’ve struggled to rise above the water level of mediocrity. How they adjust as the season goes on will be fascinating to observe.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as Ten NBA Trends At the 2024–25 Season Quarter Mark.
