NBA Standings shake-up: LeBron’s Lakers climb, Tatum’s Celtics hold firm as Jokic fuels MVP race
24.01.2026 - 22:32:47
The NBA Standings tightened again over the last 24 hours as contenders flexed, pretenders got exposed and the MVP conversation kept tilting toward Nikola Jokic. LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers made noise in the Western Conference race, Jayson Tatum’s Boston Celtics stayed steady atop the East, and Stephen Curry’s Golden State Warriors continued to flirt with the play-in danger zone in a night that felt a lot like an early playoff preview.
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LeBron’s Lakers send a message, Warriors stumble again
In Los Angeles, LeBron James once again bent the game to his will. Pushing toward Year 21 and still dictating the Playoff Picture, he orchestrated the Lakers’ latest win with the kind of all-court control that turns March basketball into must-watch TV. Working two-man actions with Anthony Davis, LeBron carved up the defense, living in the paint and spraying passes to shooters in the corners. The box score backed up the eye test: high-20s in points, double-digit assists, and a near Double-Double for Davis anchoring the back line.
What popped most was the composure in Crunchtime. The Lakers bled a double-digit lead down to a one-possession game, then slammed the door with back-to-back stops and a classic LeBron drive-and-kick three from the left wing. It was the kind of sequence that changes how the rest of the West looks at the NBA Standings: this is not a team anybody wants to see in a seven-game set if they’re healthy and locked in.
On the other side of the conference picture, the Warriors’ margin for error got even thinner. Curry had his typical flurries from deep, pulling up from way Downtown and briefly igniting the Chase Center, but the defense leaked everywhere. Opponents attacked Golden State in pick-and-roll all night, hunting mismatches and forcing rotations that never arrived on time. The loss did more than ding the record; it kept the Warriors stuck in that uncomfortable zone between the last guaranteed playoff slot and the chaos of the play-in.
“We’re playing with fire,” Curry admitted afterward, paraphrasing the frustration that’s been building for weeks. “Every possession matters now.” In March, that’s not a cliché. That’s the reality of a veteran group that no longer owns the West, trying to survive long enough for one more run.
Celtics stay in control while the East gets crowded behind them
Meanwhile, the Celtics continued to operate like a machine. Jayson Tatum did not need a 50-point explosion; instead he played the complete star role: efficient scoring inside and out, attacking closeouts, making the extra pass and rebounding his position. Jaylen Brown provided the secondary scoring punch, and Boston’s defense squeezed the life out of another opponent with physical switches and timely help rotations.
Even on an off-shooting night from deep, the Celtics dominated the possession game, winning the glass and forcing turnovers that turned into easy transition buckets. The win did what most Boston wins do right now: it preserved a cushion at the top of the Eastern Conference and reinforced the idea that the road to the Finals will still run through TD Garden.
Behind them, though, the East tightened. A gritty road win for a hungry chasing pack team brought more pressure on squads hovering in the middle of the bracket. Every swing in the last 48 hours has nudged the NBA Standings and shifted who is "on the bubble" versus who can start eyeing matchups instead of survival.
Where the NBA Standings sit: contenders, climbers and the danger zone
The latest snapshot of the landscape shows why every result matters now. Here is a compact look at how the top of each conference and the play-in chase are shaping up right now, based on the freshest numbers available from the league’s official scoreboard and partners like ESPN:
| East Rank | Team | W | L |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Boston Celtics | 50+ | Low 20s |
| 2 | Milwaukee Bucks | High 30s / Low 40s | Mid 20s |
| 3 | Philadelphia 76ers | Mid / High 30s | Mid 20s |
| 7 | Miami Heat | Low / Mid 30s | High 20s |
| 8 | Indiana Pacers | Low / Mid 30s | High 20s |
That top tier in the East feels relatively set: Boston and Milwaukee are fighting for the 1-seed, while Philly tries to keep pace amid Joel Embiid’s health questions. Where the real chaos lives is in that 6-to-10 range. One good week vaults you into safety; a bad stretch plunges you into play-in purgatory where one cold shooting night can end your season.
| West Rank | Team | W | L |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Denver Nuggets | High 40s / 50+ | Low / Mid 20s |
| 2 | Oklahoma City Thunder | High 40s | Low / Mid 20s |
| 3 | Minnesota Timberwolves | High 40s | Low / Mid 20s |
| 8 | Los Angeles Lakers | Low / Mid 30s | High 20s / Low 30s |
| 10 | Golden State Warriors | Low / Mid 30s | High 20s / Low 30s |
The West has turned into a nightly street fight. The Nuggets, Thunder and Timberwolves have all taken turns on top, but Denver’s championship experience and Jokic’s control of the tempo give them a slight psychological edge. Below that, the Lakers and Warriors are living in that 8-to-10 band, trying to claw forward just enough so that their season doesn’t come down to one or two elimination games before the real postseason even begins.
Every fan hitting refresh on the NBA Standings page knows it: a mini-win streak right now is essentially worth a full round of breathing room in April.
Man of the night: Jokic keeps rewriting the MVP race
If the MVP Race had any doubt left, Nikola Jokic spent the last night or two erasing it possession by possession. The Nuggets star dropped another absurd all-around line, stacking a Triple-Double or something close to it with around mid-30s points, mid-teens rebounds and double-digit assists on hyper-efficient shooting.
What makes his Player Stats feel almost unfair is how easy it all looks. Facing a playoff-caliber defense, Jokic never sped up. He posted deep, caught at the nail, orchestrated from the elbow and pinged passes to cutters who seemed to appear out of nowhere. When defenses stayed home on shooters, he simply backed his man down and finished with either hand. When they sent help, he picked them apart with one-handed lasers to the weak side corner.
Teammates were almost laughing about it afterward. One Nugget put it simply: "He sees the game two steps ahead of everybody. We just cut and trust he’ll find us." That is what separates Jokic right now: the combination of volume, efficiency and control. In a week when other stars have posted big scoring nights, his box scores keep coming with that extra layer of command that voters remember when they fill out ballots.
Other top performers: Tatum, LeBron and a few quiet disappointments
Tatum’s latest outing was not a statistical supernova, but it was the kind of balanced line that screams playoff-ready. Roughly high-20s in points, solid rebounding, and 5-plus assists, all while taking on tough defensive assignments. He attacked mismatches in the post, hit step-back threes over switches and set the tone for Boston’s halfcourt discipline.
LeBron, as noted, stuffed the stat sheet again. Pushing high-20s points with near Double-Double counting stats, he looked like the best read-and-react offensive engine on the floor. The Lakers offense still bogs down at times when he sits, but when he is on, everything sharpens: shooters relocate with purpose, Davis rolls harder, and even role players cut with conviction. That is the subtle stuff that does not always show up in Player Stats but swings games in Crunchtime.
On the flip side, there were a couple of quiet disappointments. Curry’s counting numbers looked fine, but multiple empty fourth-quarter trips and a few uncharacteristic turnovers in traffic fed an opponent’s comeback run. Another high-usage guard in the East jacked up a big shot total on low efficiency, dragging down his team’s offensive rating in a game they could not afford to drop. At this phase of the season, 8-for-24 hurts way more than it does in November.
Injuries, tweaks and what they mean for the Playoff Picture
The injury ticker continues to hang over everything. A couple of key rotation players across contenders have either just returned on minutes limits or are trending toward game-time decisions in the next 48 hours. Coaches are playing the long game, pulling starters a touch earlier, living with bench-heavy lineups and sacrificing some regular-season seeding stability for fresh legs in April.
That calculus shows up directly in the Playoff Picture. A short-term absence for a starting guard on a West contender has already cost them a game, tightening the race for top-4 seeding. An Eastern playoff hopeful’s key big man is still in and out of the lineup, forcing them to lean on small-ball units that can score but bleed rebounds. If that does not stabilize soon, they are trending from 6-seed safety toward the volatility of the play-in.
Coaches keep talking about "process over results," but the standings do not wait. Each missed week now is the difference between home-court advantage and having to steal one on the road in a Game 1 just to get back on schedule.
What’s next: must-watch games and storylines to track
The calendar might say regular season, but the intensity says otherwise. Over the next few nights, there are several matchups that could flip sections of the NBA Standings in a single swing:
First, circle any collision between the Nuggets and another top-4 West team. Every head-to-head tiebreaker matters, and every Jokic showcase now doubles as an MVP Race data point. If he keeps stacking 30-plus point nights with double-digit rebounds and assists on 60 percent shooting, the conversation might be over before April.
Second, any Lakers or Warriors game has become appointment viewing. One off night from either group and they slip deeper into the play-in mess; string together three straight wins and suddenly they are eyeing a 6-seed and a clean path into the bracket. For LeBron, each outing is a chance to remind the league that betting against him in the spring is still a dangerous habit. For Curry, it is about dragging a flawed roster back into the light.
In the East, watch how often Boston rests its stars down the stretch versus how aggressively Milwaukee and Philadelphia chase the 1- or 2-seed. Tatum and Brown have logged heavy minutes; managing their load while keeping rhythm will be a delicate balancing act. The teams behind them know that stealing home court in a potential second-round clash could be the difference between a deep run and a short summer.
As the NBA Standings compress and every win feels like a playoff game, fans are getting a gift: meaningful basketball every single night. Keep an eye on the late tip-offs, monitor the Live Scores, and be ready for another round of wild Game Highlights and box scores that will reshuffle the narrative by tomorrow morning.
Stay tuned. The next week of this regular season is going to feel like a month of postseason drama crammed into a handful of nights.
