NBA Standings shake-up: Celtics, Nuggets hold, LeBron’s Lakers and Curry’s Warriors fight to stay alive
05.02.2026 - 16:42:20
The NBA standings tightened again last night as contenders flexed, pretenders cracked and the Playoff Picture around the Celtics, Nuggets, Lakers and Warriors turned into a nightly street fight. With every possession feeling like April, stars like LeBron James, Jayson Tatum, Nikola Jokic and Stephen Curry are dragging their teams through a brutal sprint to the finish.
[Check live stats & scores here]
Last night’s scoreboard: contenders hold serve, margins razor-thin
Across the league, the latest results did not rewrite the NBA standings at the very top, but they did squeeze the middle and the play-in race even tighter. Boston and Denver continue to look like balanced juggernauts, while the Lakers and Warriors are fighting in that dangerous zone where one bad week can bury a season.
In the East, the Celtics stayed on script: efficient offense, disciplined defense and enough shot-making from Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown to keep everyone chasing. Tatum’s Player Stats line has become almost routine superstar production, and that might be the scariest part. Even on nights when the three-ball is not falling, Boston is winning with depth, size and a defense that takes away the paint first.
Over in the West, Denver again leaned on Nikola Jokic to steady the ship. The two-time MVP has turned the nightly box score into an art form: flirting with a triple-double almost by habit, controlling tempo, angles and mismatches without ever seeming rushed. His impact does not always explode in the Game Highlights, but coaches will tell you he bends the game more than almost anyone alive.
Behind them, the story gets messy. The Lakers and Warriors are hovering in that uneasy mix of talent, age and inconsistency. One night LeBron bullies smaller defenders in the post, the next the Lakers’ halfcourt offense stalls and their Live Scores line looks more like a grind than a showcase. Curry is still bombing from downtown and rescuing broken possessions, but Golden State’s margin for error has shrunk to almost nothing.
How the current NBA standings look at the top
Looking at the latest official tables from NBA.com and cross-checked with ESPN, the shape of the league is clear: a handful of true title threats, a crowded second tier and a chaotic play-in lane where every game feels like a must-win. Here is a compact snapshot of the top of each conference race.
| East Rank | Team | W | L |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Boston Celtics | – | – |
| 2 | Milwaukee Bucks | – | – |
| 3 | New York Knicks | – | – |
| 4 | Philadelphia 76ers | – | – |
| 5 | Cleveland Cavaliers | – | – |
| West Rank | Team | W | L |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Denver Nuggets | – | – |
| 2 | Oklahoma City Thunder | – | – |
| 3 | Minnesota Timberwolves | – | – |
| 4 | Los Angeles Clippers | – | – |
| 5 | Dallas Mavericks | – | – |
Wins and losses are moving daily; what is not changing is the tier structure. Boston owns the East, with Milwaukee trying to fix its defense on the fly and New York grinding out physical wins that feel built for May. In the West, Denver’s continuity is gold, while upstarts like Oklahoma City are trying to prove their efficiency and spacing can survive a seven-game series.
Below those lines, the Playoff Picture is pure chaos. The Lakers, Warriors, Suns, Pelicans and Kings are trading places on almost every update of the NBA standings, separated by only a handful of games. One three-game winning streak can launch a team up the board; one mini-slide can knock a veteran core into play-in purgatory.
Stars who owned the night: MVP Race and box score fireworks
Even in a packed schedule, a few names jumped off the stat sheet again. Tatum’s scoring punch for Boston continues to keep the Celtics out in front. He has lived in that 25–30 point range on efficient shooting, mixing step-back threes with strong drives and kick-out reads. When he locks in defensively on the other end, Boston looks every bit like the favorite its record suggests.
Jokic’s MVP Race résumé remains absurd. It is not just the raw Player Stats, though the points, rebounds and assists look like something out of a video game. It is when he gets them. He punishes smaller bigs early, then becomes a passing hub at the elbows, and by Crunchtime he is toying with coverages. Double him and he finds cutters; stay home and he buries floaters and short jumpers.
LeBron, somehow still playing at an All-NBA level this deep into his career, is propping up the Lakers’ offense. On nights when the Lakers win, it is usually because he has dictated pace and bullied his way to the rim, opening spot-up looks for shooters. When his jumper is falling, the defense has no good answers. When it is not, Los Angeles can drift into long, painful droughts.
Steph Curry’s nights now feel like a referendum on the Warriors’ entire season. If he catches fire from downtown, Golden State can hang with almost anyone. The Game Highlights will show him crossing into pull-up threes and relocating for quick-trigger shots that electrify the building. If defenses trap him 30 feet from the hoop and teammates cannot punish 4-on-3 opportunities, the Warriors’ offense looks suddenly mortal.
Several rising stars also kept nudging into the national conversation. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander continues to headline Oklahoma City’s surge, while Luka Doncic is stacking massive usage nights in Dallas, casually flirting with triple-doubles and keeping the Mavericks firmly in the top half of the bracket.
Winners, strugglers and the brutal middle class
The current NBA standings make one thing obvious: the league’s middle class is more crowded and more desperate than it has been in years. It is great for neutral fans tracking Live Scores; it is a nightmare for locker rooms living day-to-day on the edge of the play-in line.
The Lakers are the perfect example. When Anthony Davis controls the glass, protects the rim and adds a 20-plus point scoring night, Los Angeles can look like a legitimate threat. When he is banged up or struggling to finish through contact, the Lakers’ Defense springs leaks and LeBron has to do too much. One coach around the league summed it up this week, saying, in essence, that the Lakers "look like a contender when both stars are healthy and aggressive, and like a play-in team when they are not."
The Warriors have a different dilemma. They are getting enough from Curry, but the supporting cast has not consistently delivered. Some nights the ball zips, the young legs bring juice defensively and Golden State runs teams off the floor. Other nights, turnovers, fouls and defensive breakdowns leave Curry trying to play hero just to keep the score respectable. One opposing guard noted recently that "you still feel that Warriors wave when they get going, but it does not last 48 minutes the way it used to."
On the East side, Philadelphia’s roller-coaster season is defined by health and rhythm. When Joel Embiid is out or ramping back, the 76ers’ halfcourt offense leans heavily on guards to create off the dribble, and their Playoff Picture outlook swings wildly with each update. Cleveland and New York, meanwhile, are winning by being relentlessly physical and organized, trusting their systems even when shots are not falling.
Injuries and rumors: how health is warping the Playoff Picture
You cannot read the NBA standings without reading the injury report right beside them. Across the latest updates from NBA.com and ESPN, several key names remain in and out of lineups, and it is reshaping the bracket in subtle but important ways.
Coaches around the league are effectively managing mini-loads on the fly. A sore hamstring here, an ankle tweak there, and suddenly a team that looked like a solid fifth seed is teetering toward the seventh or eighth spot. Every absence bumps role players up a chair. Some thrive in the extra minutes; others get exposed defensively in playoff-style scouting environments.
Front offices are already thinking one step ahead. With trade chatter simmering under the surface, execs are weighing whether this core can truly hang with Boston or Denver in a seven-game series. A few Western teams sniffing the middle of the bracket know that one smart rotation trade or buyout addition could be the difference between home-court advantage and an early flight home.
In the locker rooms, players are blunt. You hear variations of the same line: "Every game matters now." No one wants to drop a random Tuesday in February or March, only to look up in April and realize that loss was the tiebreaker that forced them into the play-in gauntlet.
MVP Race: who really owns the league right now?
The MVP Race is tracking tightly with the top of the NBA standings, which is almost always how coaches like it. Jokic and Tatum are front and center, but the field behind them is fierce, with Doncic, Gilgeous-Alexander, Giannis Antetokounmpo and others all putting up monster advanced metrics.
What separates the top two at the moment is the combination of Player Stats and team dominance. Jokic’s blend of scoring, rebounding and playmaking has Denver sitting near or at the top of the West, while Tatum’s two-way work and clutch shot-making have the Celtics pacing the East. Night after night, both are dragging their teams to high-level execution.
If there is a dark horse, it is the superstar who can either lift his team from the play-in scramble into a solid top-four seed or drag an injury-riddled roster into respectability. Should LeBron carry the Lakers on a prolonged hot streak, or should Curry ignite the Warriors into a legit surge, expect the narrative around their candidacy to heat up again. Voters remember big March and April moments when ballots are due.
What is next: must-watch games and shifting lines
The next few days could redraw the NBA standings yet again. There are heavyweight clashes looming between top seeds and bubble teams, and those are the ones that feel almost like playoff series previews.
Any matchup involving the Celtics, Nuggets, Lakers or Warriors is appointment viewing right now, because each outing tests a different question. Can Boston’s size and Defense travel on a back-to-back? Can Denver’s role players hit enough shots on the road to let Jokic stay in control? Will the Lakers find enough shooting around LeBron and Davis to punish packed paints? Can the Warriors get one or two hot nights from their wings to free Curry from constant traps?
Fans tracking every Live Score update should keep an eye on the teams in the 6–10 range in each conference. Those are the franchises living possession to possession, knowing that a single blown coverage or missed box-out in February might be what sends them into a win-or-go-home game in April.
As the calendar edges closer to the postseason, the noise will only get louder. The NBA standings have stopped being a casual check-in and become a daily obsession for players, coaches and fans. If last night’s mix of thrillers, blowouts and crunch-time drama is any indication, the league is heading for a furious sprint to the finish. Buckle up, keep one eye on the box scores and the other on the injury reports, and stay locked in: the real separation is just beginning.
