The best rivalry in basketball starts back up on opening night. On Oct. 20, Oklahoma City visits San Antonio, the team that ended its title defense in Game 7 of last year's Western Conference Finals, on the Thunder's home floor. The Spurs then ran into the Knicks in the Finals and lost 4-1, with New York coming back from double-digit deficits in all four wins. So both of the West's heavyweights start this season with a fresh scar.
We used the same method as our Eastern Conference preview. We pulled projected 2026-27 rosters from our database and ran a full Western Conference round robin through Game Sim: every team played every other team 10 times at each venue, 2,100 games in all. Then we ran the key division matchups with bigger samples. Where the raw numbers and common sense disagreed, we leaned on last season's record and the betting market to set the seeds. Then we played out the bracket, all the way through the Finals.
The summer out West
The East had the blockbusters. The West mostly had reshuffles, with a couple of big exceptions.
Oklahoma City paid the tax man. Jalen Williams' and Chet Holmgren's extensions kicked in, and the Thunder traded Lu Dort, Aaron Wiggins and Isaiah Joe for second-round picks to get under the second apron. The core of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Williams and Holmgren is intact, but the league's best bench two years running just lost three of its most-used players.
San Antonio ran it back. Per NBA.com's John Schuhmann, the Spurs return 94 percent of last season's minutes, the highest rate in the league, and added Tobias Harris on top of that. Victor Wembanyama is 22. Stephon Castle is 21. Dylan Harper is 20. That is a scary sentence for the rest of the conference.
Minnesota finally got its point guard. The Wolves sent Julius Randle and Naz Reid out in a five-team deal for LaMelo Ball, pairing him with Anthony Edwards. NBA.com's season preview points out that both are 25 and right in their primes. The catch is that Rudy Gobert, now 34, has almost no backup behind him.
The Lakers lost LeBron. He signed with Philadelphia, and L.A. is starting over around Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves. They bring back only 42 percent of last season's minutes, the lowest number in the league. Walker Kessler, Collin Sexton and Quentin Grimes are among the new faces.
Elsewhere: Houston gets Fred VanVleet back and added Marcus Smart and Bogdan Bogdanovic. Portland traded for Ja Morant to go with a returning Damian Lillard. Dallas has a new coach in Dusty May, the reigning Rookie of the Year in Cooper Flagg, and Kyrie Irving returning from a torn ACL. Utah added No. 2 pick Darryn Peterson and gets a full season of Jaren Jackson Jr. The Clippers lost Kawhi Leonard to Toronto and got hit with some of the harshest penalties in league history: five future first-round picks, a $30 million fine and a yearlong suspension for owner Steve Ballmer.
The betting market sees a two-team race. Sporting News' odds roundup has Oklahoma City and San Antonio both at +145 to win the West at BetMGM, with Denver (+1100) and Minnesota (+1300) the next closest at DraftKings. For the title, Sports Illustrated lists the Spurs and Thunder as co-favorites at +270.
Likely division winners
Northwest: Oklahoma City Thunder
NBA.com called this the deepest division in the league, and it is. Our sims still had the Thunder winning it comfortably. OKC beat Denver in 78 percent of our games (118.6 to 108.6), Minnesota in 72 percent and Portland in 78 percent. Gilgeous-Alexander projects for 30.9 points a night, and a healthy Williams (20.2) is worth a lot of the depth they gave away.
Behind them, Denver beat Minnesota 56 percent of the time. Nikola Jokic projects for 27.8 points, 13.1 rebounds and 10.1 assists, which is still absurd. Edwards (28.2) and Ball (22.5) will be a blast to watch, but the Wolves' frontcourt depth is a real concern over 82 games.
Southwest: San Antonio Spurs
San Antonio beat Houston in 64 percent of our games and edged Dallas 54 percent of the time. More importantly, the Spurs beat Oklahoma City in 54 percent of our head-to-head games, picking up right where they left off after winning eight of 12 meetings last season. Wembanyama projects for 25.7 points and 11.4 rebounds, with Castle (18.4 points, 6.9 assists), De'Aaron Fox (18.2) and Harper (16.7) behind him.
One note on Memphis: the Grizzlies actually beat the Spurs and Rockets in our sims. Rookie Cameron Boozer and a deep roster look good on paper, but the team that won 25 games last year is not a real threat to win this division. We are treating that as a sign of a deep roster, not a top-four team.
Pacific: Los Angeles Lakers
The weakest division in the West is a coin flip between the Lakers and Phoenix. L.A. won 52 percent of its games against the Suns and 64 percent against Golden State. Doncic projects for 31.9 points, 7.7 rebounds and 8.2 assists, and Reaves for 23.8. Defense is going to be a problem again, but the Lakers have the best player in the division, and that is usually enough. Devin Booker (27.0) gives Phoenix a chance, and the Warriors will go as far as Stephen Curry (25.7) and a banged-up Jimmy Butler can carry them.
Projected West standings
- Oklahoma City Thunder
- San Antonio Spurs
- Minnesota Timberwolves
- Denver Nuggets
- Houston Rockets
- Los Angeles Lakers
- Phoenix Suns (play-in)
- Golden State Warriors (play-in)
- Dallas Mavericks (play-in)
- Portland Trail Blazers (play-in)
- Memphis Grizzlies
- Utah Jazz
- Sacramento Kings
- New Orleans Pelicans
- Los Angeles Clippers
Memphis and Sacramento were far better in our sims than they will be in real life, so we kept them out of the play-in. Utah is the team we would watch to crash it. The Clippers were the worst team in our entire round robin, and with Brandon Ingram starting the year injured, it is hard to argue.
Simulated West playoffs
Single play-in games were simulated 50 times each. Every playoff series was simulated 49 times, with 28 games at the higher seed and 21 on the road to match the 2-2-1-1-1 format. Whoever won more games advanced.
Play-in
- Suns over Warriors (70 percent, avg 112.1-101.3). Phoenix takes the 7 seed.
- Mavericks over Trail Blazers (70 percent, avg 115.8-102.9)
- Mavericks over Warriors (Dallas won 64 percent in San Francisco, avg 114.5-108.8). Dallas takes the 8 seed.
First round
- Mavericks over Thunder (Dallas 55 percent, avg 109.7-109.3)
- Rockets over Nuggets (Houston 51 percent, avg 112.2-112.0)
- Lakers over Timberwolves (L.A. 59 percent, avg 109.2-107.3)
- Spurs over Suns (65 percent, avg 113.5-108.2)
Yes, we are as surprised as you are. Our sims sent the 64-win Thunder home in the first round against an 8 seed. It was close: the average score was within half a point, and OKC won exactly half the games played in Oklahoma City. But Flagg and Irving kept stealing the games in Dallas, and the Thunder's thinner bench showed up in our numbers. We would not bet our house on this one, but it is a real warning about what losing Dort, Wiggins and Joe could cost them in April. Houston and Denver was a true coin flip, with each team dominating at home. Luka beat Edwards in the battle of the stars.
Second round
- Mavericks over Rockets (67 percent, avg 113.8-107.3)
- Spurs over Lakers (67 percent, avg 111.8-104.6)
Dallas kept rolling, and Houston could not make the shots to keep up. San Antonio won 86 percent of its home games against the Lakers, which is about what you would expect when Wembanyama is protecting the rim against a team that struggles to defend.
Western Conference Finals
San Antonio Spurs over Dallas Mavericks. The Spurs won 30 of 49 simulated games (61 percent), with an average score of 115.1 to 110.2. The Cinderella run ends against a team that is simply bigger, deeper and more experienced after last spring.
The NBA Finals: Celtics vs. Spurs
In our Eastern Conference preview, Boston came out of the East by beating the defending champion Knicks and top-seeded Detroit. So we put the Celtics and Spurs in Game Sim. Since we do not know yet who will have the better record, we ran it both ways.
- Spurs with home court: Celtics won 65 percent of games, avg 113.3-107.1
- Celtics with home court: Celtics won 67 percent of games, avg 115.7-110.9
That is a clear result. Boston won about two out of every three games no matter where they were played. The Celtics' shooting and offensive rebounding gave the Spurs the same problems they gave Detroit and New York. Jayson Tatum (25.1 projected points) and a deep supporting cast just had more ways to score than San Antonio could handle. The Spurs are the future of the league. Our simulator just does not think the future is here yet.
The pick
Western Conference champion: San Antonio Spurs.
NBA champion: Boston Celtics.
The sportsbooks have San Antonio and Oklahoma City as co-favorites, and Boston fifth on the title board at +1300. Our simulator agrees with half of that. It loves the Spurs in the West, it is worried about the Thunder's depth, and it kept picking the Celtics in a series against anyone. Two years after Boston's last title, we are calling banner number 19.
Think we are wrong about OKC? Run Thunder vs. Mavericks yourself on our NBA Game Simulator, check the nightly numbers on the NBA predictions board, or keep an eye on the NBA injury report. Opening night is Oct. 20, with Thunder at Spurs. The arguments start now.
