"To end the season 12 games over . This is the 15th season LeBron James and Stephen Curry have been active players in the NBA together. The Golden State Warriors will play the Sacramento Kings just after James takes on the New Orleans Pelicans as the West teams fight to gain entry to the playoffs. The Lakers finished the season winning 13 of their last 18 games and slipped into eighth in the West at the finish line after spending months stuck in ninth or lower. That's 16 (17, unofficially) more games than last season and the most in his six-year tenure with the Lakers. The Warriors then went 27-12 to finish the season. But all the things we've gone through and the way the West is stacked, that's our situation. Keep track of all the latest NBA play-in and playoff news and happenings as the postseason gets underway. In 2016, when they blasted the league en route to 73 wins, the Warriors' current 46-36 record would've had them in the No. Between 2011 and 2022, either James or Curry played in the Finals for 11 out of 12 years. The conference's depth now is totally different, and the margin for error is the tightest it has been in the past two decades. The Lakers just completed their second-best regular season in the past 13 years, behind only the 52-win season in 2019-20 that ended in a title. Like the Warriors, the Lakers will be awarded no bonus points based on a perspective that looks at the entire lay of the land. playThe numbers to know ahead of the Lakers-Pelicans play-in gameTake a sneak peek at the important stats and betting tidbits ahead of the Lakers-Pelicans play-in matchup. In addition to getting healthier, James adjusted his shooting form and finished the season at 41% from 3-point range, the best of his career. This is James and Curry's existence. They are used to heavy expectations and doomsday predictions, and the presumption will be no different this week. "When you're out on the floor as a player performing at that level and understanding what's expected of yourself and your team, that environment brings the best out of you. "when they join up in Paris for Team USA in an attempt to win an Olympic gold medal. "You can't avoid those conversations; they've been hovering over us [for years]," Curry said Monday.
