Healing Thunder can still make run
— -- The Oklahoma City Thunder can be thankful on this Thanksgiving weekend that help is on the way. Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, who have both missed the team's past 14 games -- 10 of them losses -- participated in non-contact portions of practice on Monday, and Westbrook is now set to play in tonight's game against the Knicks. Durant should follow soon.
Now, the question for Oklahoma City is whether it's already too late for Durant and Westbrook to lead the team back to the postseason. At 4-12, the Thunder sit 13th in the Western Conference, six games behind the current eighth seed (the 10-6 Phoenix Suns). Can Oklahoma City close the gap?
Projecting the Western Conference
The first thing we need to assess when evaluating the Thunder's playoff chances is how high the bar will be set in the West. Last season, it took 49 wins for the Dallas Mavericks to hold off the Phoenix Suns for the eighth seed. The bottom of the West playoff race might not quite be so tough this season.
Simulating the remainder of the season 1,000 times yields an average of 47.4 wins for the eighth seed in the West. But that's not necessarily the number Oklahoma City needs to hit, since the gap between eighth and ninth may be larger than last season. Indeed, on average the team that finishes ninth in the West wins 45.3 games, which would mean the Thunder have to get to 46 wins to get in.
Obviously, there's a high degree of variability in that projection. Depending on how things fall, Oklahoma City may need to win as many as 50 games to reach the playoffs or fewer than 45. Now let's see how likely the Thunder are to get to those marks.
Projecting Oklahoma City
If Durant joins Westbrook in the next couple days, and the Thunder play at the same level as last season, when they won 59 games. Factoring in Oklahoma City's upcoming schedule (an average team would go about 31-33 the remainder of the way against the Thunder's opponents) suggests the team could expect to finish with 48 wins.
We can repeat that exercise for various Durant returns, assuming that Oklahoma City plays at approximately a 41-win level of play with Westbrook but not Durant, as projected before the season. That yields the set of expectations in the box below.
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