The Washington Wizards are facing off against the Brooklyn Nets in the second night of a back-to-back tonight.
The Wizards lost to the Orlando Magic last night, 110-90. That makes it six straight losses for Washington, who now have seven straight games coming up against teams below .500 to try and right the ship.
The upcoming two-week period of hoops is set to be an all-out tank race. The Wizards play the Nets, the Portland Trail Blazers, the Charlotte Hornets, the Miami Heat, the Utah Jazz, and then the Toronto Raptors (twice).
Each of those teams would not-so-subtly love to employ Duke’s Cooper Flagg, even the Miami Heat, whose first-round pick goes to… who else… the Oklahoma City Thunder if it falls outside the lottery.
The Wizards have the “luxury” of being so deep in the basement that they can actually afford to try and win games down the stretch of the season. Now, does that mean that I think they’re gonna rattle off a win streak and charge toward the play-in? Of course not. But it is a nice bonus for the fans, who will get to watch some more competitive basketball than they may have been expecting.
Speaking of being more competitive than expected…
The Nets have actually been a solid ball club as of late and have an outside shot at making the playoffs. Don’t take this as any sort of endorsement of Brooklyn’s roster, though. It’s merely a testament to the frailty of the Eastern Conference this season that the Nets’ brazen tank job very well could result in a shot at the playoffs with a record miles south of .500. They traded two of their three best players during the season to get here.
The Nets are coming off a huge win against the Philadelphia 76ers (be ready for a 2000-word-plus Bullet Points about them in a few weeks, by the way) that saw Nic Claxton sky Paul George for a game winning putback at the buzzer.
Including that win against Philly, the Nets have won four of their last five games and seven of their last nine. They trail the Chicago Bulls, who could not fathom wheeling out a watchable product, by a half-game in the standings for the final play-in spot. The East play-in race as a whole is a trainwreck — nine of the 15 East teams have a losing record.
Wizards at Nets tips off at 7 p.m. tonight at Capital One Arena.