Almost unbelievably, aside from division winners Charleston (9-1) and San Jose (8-2), getting two other teams to EARN playoff spots for Season 25 has been a near impossiblity.
Case in point -- the final game of the regular season. Seattle just needed to stay within shouting distance of San Jose in order to get the fourth and final playoff spot. So what happens? They get blown away 91-70.
So when it comes to calculating the third tie-breaker for the final West Division playoff spot (all but San Jose finished 4-6 in the West) a first occurred.
The first tie-breaker is division wins, of which Seattle and Oklahoma City each had four. The second is head to head competition, with Seattle and Oklahoma City splitting their two regular season meetings. The final tie-breaker is points differential over the entire season...the number of points per game compared with points per game yielded. The 21-point win by San Jose over Seattle, amazingly, resulted in an exact tie in points differential between Seattle and Oklahoma City, with both the Stampede and the Lariats giving up exactly 38 points more than they scored over the 10-game season.
This unprecedented situation necessitates a playoff game between the two teams to determine the fourth playoff team. The stats from the game will not count toward regular season totals, but any injuries that occur in the game will.
Unbelievable. One more point either way in the final game of the regular season and this situation would have been resolved. Instead we will have, for the first time in MBA history, an extra game prior to the playoffs.
Neither Seattle nor Oklahoma City deserves it, although the Lariats actually won their last game (89-75 over hapless Sacramento) to help set up the extra contest.
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