Coming into the final few months of the NBA regular season, we are taking a look at one of the league’s most-known teams, the Los Angeles Lakers.
Can the Lakers make a deep playoff run or will it be an early exit like previous years? Let’s figure it out before heading to the top-rated sportsbooks.
NBA 2025 Championship Odds
| The Elite | The Contenders | The Longshots | The Underdogs |
|---|---|---|---|
| Boston Celtics +180 | Cleveland Cavaliers +550 | Denver Nuggets +1400 | New York Knicks +2000 |
| Oklahoma City Thunder +200 | LA Lakers +1000 | Golden State Warriors +1600 | MIL Bucks +5000 |
Previous Playoff Runs
As we all know, the Lakers have been one of the NBA powerhouse teams since changing location from Minnesota to Los Angeles in 1960. Although their success wasn’t instant, the Lakers have won 12 NBA championships over the previous 65 years.
In recent seasons, the Lakers won the NBA championship in 2020. Their previous championship titles before that came in 2009 and 2010. That said, it’s been five seasons since the Lakers beat the Miami Heat 4-2 in the 2020 final. Can they come close again this season?
Since then, the Lakers have failed to get past the opening round on two occasions, making the conference finals in 2023, where they were swept by the Denver Nuggets (the eventual winners).
Chasing the Pack
When taking a look at their current position in the Western Conference, they are comfortably sitting in 4th position alongside the Houston Rockets.
We really can’t see them slip any further down the standings than 5th position come the end of the regular season. However, at the same time, they could easily catch 2nd place, with Memphis and Denver currently only two wins ahead of them.
The Lakers have won 61% of their games to date with the two teams ahead having won 64% of their games. The top-seeded team, Oklahoma City, won’t get caught by anybody for the remainder of the season with an eye-watering 81% of winnings.
As things currently stand, our best guess is to assume they could face either the Clippers, Rockets, Mavericks or Timberwolves come playoff time. It’s almost a certainty the only team they won’t have to face in round one is Oklahoma. We can’t rule out their chances of facing the Denver Nuggets in round one again either.
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Trades and Coaching Chances
The Lakers are essentially a somewhat new team at this stage of the season due to all the trades that took place in recent weeks. Yes, they have been performing well in the short term since they traded away Anthony Davis and brought in Luka Doncic, but short-term success means nothing in this league.
The Lakers made some strong and bold trade moves prior to the trade deadline in bringing in Luka Doncic but, at the time of writing he has only played four games for his new team (winning 50% of those games).
Considering it’s been JJ Redick’s first season as the Lakers head coach, things have been going well, even though they have been struggling defensively with a bottom 10 defensive rating and a point difference sitting at just +1.3.
Still, they are on course for their best league finish since 2019.
Can The Lakers Make A Deep Playoff Run
With all things considered, this really is a tough one. Yes, they have an all-star player in Luka Doncic, who could carry them all the way with the support cast of players he has around him. However, we do worry about their defense and the fact this would be their coach’s first playoff experience.
The Lakers have been doing the simple things right, like dominating against the weaker teams in the league or against teams with less than a 50% win rate. More importantly, they are beating teams with an above 50% win rate, having gone 18-8 thus far this season.
It’s hard to tell how far this Lakers team can go. Maybe they haven’t got quite the tools in their armour yet to go all the way to winning the championship. However, we believe that, with a bit of improvement and chemistry to be worked out with Doncic, yes, they can make a deep run into the postseason.
At the time of writing, the Lakers are a nice +1500 to win the NBA championship, which is the 4th favorite joint alongside the Houston Rockets and Denver Nuggets.
A more reasonable betting opportunity might be their odds to win the conference at +800. However, they still have to overcome Oklahoma, along with the danger of facing Memphis and possibly the Nuggets again. We believe the Lakers can make a deep playoff run, but we do believe the Conference finals are as far as they might get this season.
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