Updated: April 2, 2012, 11:39 AM ET

Power Rankings: West takes over top two spots

Week:
 
Team:
By Marc Stein
ESPN.com
Monday, April 2

Two Western Conference teams, for the first time all season, occupy the top two spots in ESPN.com's weekly NBA Power Rankings.

The Oklahoma City Thunder have risen to a season-high No. 1 and, by dealing the Chicago Bulls their second heavy defeat of the week Sunday, thus opened the door for the San Antonio Spurs to rise to a season-best-tying No. 2.

With the Derrick Rose-less Bulls and Miami suddenly looking as shaky as they have all season, it was left to the Boston Celtics to carry the East's flag on this Monday. Boston's 15-5 record since the All-Star break is second only to the Bulls' 15-4 mark, catapulting the Celts to No. 7 -- their first taste of the top 10 all season, believe it or not -- after Sunday's rout of the visiting Heat without the ailing Ray Allen.

The other significant upward move in the latest edition of the ranks sees the Los Angeles Clippers, capitalizing on the lack of consistency outside the top four, vaulting seven spots to the No. 5 slot on the strength of a five-game winning streak. Those five victories, all at home, have calmed things down for under-fire coach Vinny Del Negro, who has weathered widespread reports of locker room chaos to steady the Clips after they'd fallen all the way from No. 4 to No. 12.

Click here every Monday in the regular season for the latest fresh and nonautomated pulse-take of the league's 30 teams, with the usual dishing from ESPN Stats & Information and the Elias Sports Bureau. Click here to rank the teams yourself, or click here to comment on these rankings.

Also, check out John Hollinger's daily power rankings.

2011-12 Power Rankings: Week 14
RANKTEAM / RECORD TRENDINGCOMMENTS
1
1
Last Week: 2		The Thunder actually lost five games in March -- after just seven Ls in December, January and February combined -- but that doesn't seem to matter much now that they've (A) toppled the Heat, Lakers and Bulls by a combined 39 points in the space of seven days and (B) improved to 6-0 in the Derek Fisher era.
2
1
Last Week: 3		Bowing at the altar of Pop: San Antonio has the league's No. 3 road record (15-10) after an 0-5 start that prompted the coach to memorably announce that "we suck on the road." Bowing at the altar of Pop II: Timmy, Manu and Tony have all played in the same game only 18 times all season. #howdoeshekeepdoingit?
3
Chicago
42-12
2
Last Week: 1		Can't speak for Bulls fans, but the committee (of one) is prepared to pardon a blowout loss at OKC without D-Rose because the team has generally been so resilient without him, going 14-6 in those 20 games. The Bulls lose me completely, though, when it comes to their handling of Tom Thibodeau's contract. Completely.
4
Miami
37-14
--

Last Week: 4		You've barely heard a word about Erik Spoelstra this season, amid all the scrutiny Mike Brown and Vinny Del Negro have been attracting on the other side of the country, but something tells me that's about to change after Miami followed up six road Ls in March with a no-show in Boston. As for LeBron, read this tweet.
5
7
Last Week: 12		Give it up to Vinny Del Negro. If it was all his fault that the Clips cratered to 26-21 with a humbling loss to the overmatched Hornets in Chris Paul's New Orleans homecoming, VDN has to get a healthy share of the credit after L.A. went 5-0 on a save-the-coach's-job homestand against mostly hungry opposition.
6
1
Last Week: 5		The Lakers can only hope last week was the worst week of the season, with Kobe going ice cold until the Golden State win and Bynum seemingly intent on convincing us he has no plans to listen to his coach ... until he rolled his ankle. Momentum shifts so fast in this lockout-shortened season. At Sessions-esque speed.
7
Boston
30-22
7
Last Week: 14		Too good since the break -- and too dominant in the first of three remaining meetings with Miami -- to keep the Celts out of the top 10 any longer. Don't care how hard their schedule looks from here. Is there a team outside of the East's top two that you believe in more at playoff time than Doc's old-timers and Rondo?
8
Indiana
31-21
3
Last Week: 11		How unexpected was the rally in Houston that nudged the Pacers to 10 games over .500? According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Indy had lost its previous 51 road games in which it trailed by 10 or more points at the end of the third quarter ... dating to a win in November 2008 on the same Toyota Center floor.
9
Dallas
30-23
4
Last Week: 13		Time to bury all the talk about the champs missing the playoffs? Dirk averaged 25.2 points per game in March, West and Haywood are back from injury at last ... and a 12-6 record on the second night of back-to-backs (after Friday's comeback in Orlando) suggests that these thirtysomethings still have some fight left.
10
Memphis
28-22
2
Last Week: 8		The Griz are just 5-8 since getting Z-Bo back and, perhaps more amazingly, tied with the Bobcats on the short list of two teams this season without a single player having scored 30 points in a game. Yet you can be sure the Lakers would not be loving a Gasol-on-Gasol matchup in Round 1 if the playoffs started today.
11
Orlando
32-21
6
Last Week: 5		You can see it coming. The Magic were in the driver's seat to finish third in the East and avoid Chicago until Round 3, only to leave the distinct impression with their last three Ls that they're quite capable of slippage. Which makes you wonder, when it comes to SVG, if he even wants to keep coaching Team Roller Coaster.
12
Atlanta
31-23
5
Last Week: 7		The committee happened to be watching SportsCenter on Wednesday night when our man Scott Van Pelt, watching Atlanta absorb a beatdown at home from the Rose-less Bulls, opined that the Hawks are quite an "odd team" that's really good when they're good and really bad when they're bad. Pretty much sums it up.
13
Denver
29-24
4
Last Week: 17		Trying to keep alive a playoff streak that dates to 2004, Denver caught a huge break Sunday night in Orlando when back spasms shelved Dwight Howard. Let's see if the Nuggets actually build on that this time, after celebrating their rout in Chicago by somehow losing in Toronto with a full night off between games.
14
Phoenix
26-26
5
Last Week: 9		We might have jinxed them. We might have gotten carried away with their 11-4 surge out of the All-Star break and prematurely punted them into the top 10. Blame nostalgia and blame Nash. We're all rooting so hard for the dude to find some semblance of joy in the desert that last week's bump to No. 9 seemed harmless.
15
Utah
27-26
2
Last Week: 13		Figures that Favors would throw up an 0-for-13 shooting night so soon after we touted him to the sky. Far less predictable: Just over a week removed from escaping with its third one-point W of the season (most since snagging four in '93-94) in Sactown, Utah loses a must-win game at home to the Kings by one.
16
1
Last Week: 15		Linsanity launched, peaked and cratered in a total of 57 days. Can the Knicks get higher than the dreaded seventh or eighth spot without J-Lin or Amare? For all the good things happening under Woodson, they can't get any lasting separation from the .500 mark, which they've seen 10 times already this season.
17
1
Last Week: 18		They say that division titles don't really matter in the NBA, but try telling that to the Sixers. Finishing second in the Atlantic looks like it could be fatal this season, because it could well mean the difference between finishing with the fourth seed and a first-round date with the Heaters as the seventh seed. Guh.
18
Houston
28-25
2
Last Week: 16		A taste of playoff tension, via Daryl Morey's Twitter feed, after Sunday's OT loss at home to Indy: "Toughest loss of yr 4me." The GM's explanation: Houston blew a 10-point lead in the fourth, missed 15 of 29 shots at the rim and half of their 10 FTs while snagging just 62 percent of the available defensive boards. Ouch.
19
2
Last Week: 21		Are the Blazers for sale? Owner Paul Allen has adamantly denied it. Are the Blazers in full-on tank mode after trading away Gerald Wallace and Marcus Camby? Hard to make that claim as hard as Portland played over the weekend in a one-point road loss to the Clips and a home rout over Oregon native K-Love's Wolves.
20
--

Last Week: 20		I appreciate that pretty much no one outside of Wisconsin is rooting for the Bucks to overtake the Knicks for No. 8 in the East. But here's a Milwaukee cause we can all rally behind: Ilyasova is bidding to become the first player to average 12-and-8 in fewer than 28 minutes per game since Arvydas Sabonis in 1995-96!
21
2
Last Week: 19		I know you want to know where I have Love on my MVP ballot with 25 days to go before ballots are collected and all I can tell you is: Somewhere in the top five. He only averaged 30.7 ppg and 13.9 rpg in March for a battered team that's sadly 4-8 since Rubio went down and nearly out of the playoffs. Complicated!
22
Toronto
18-35
2
Last Week: 24		It was 1:44 a.m. Monday when I got my first glimpse of the Raptors' camouflage look on NBA TV. April Fools' must work differently in Canada, because the Raps wore those hideous unis for a full 48 against the Wiz instead of just circulating a bogus picture earlier in the day to scare their fans and playing in their true colors.
23
--

Last Week: 23		Although some will inevitably dismiss these numbers, since they're being racked up on a team playing for nothing this season except an arena deal written in permanent ink, be advised that Boogie Cousins is the first King to go for at least 22 and 11 in five straight games since (wow) Jerry Lucas with Cincinnati in 1967-68.
24
Detroit
19-33
3
Last Week: 27		Another Elias special: When Detroit overcame a 12-point deficit in the fourth quarter in last week's road win at Washington -- aptly described by Lawrence Frank as an "ugly, grimy, grindy" 79-77 win -- it halted a run of 115 straight defeats for the Pistons when down 12 or more in the fourth dating to January 2003.
25
New Jersey
19-35
4
Last Week: 29		The good news: D-Will has found some late-season inspiration to throw up some crazy assist numbers. The bad news: New Jersey's recent 4-1 surge ain't making it any easier for them to hang on to that protected pick (only top-three protected) they just traded to Portland in the Gerald Wallace deal.
26
4
Last Week: 22		Eight teams have a worse record than the Warriors as April begins ... none with any discernible motivation to play for anything but lottery position. The Dubs thus have some serious tanking to do in their last 15 games, since Utah inherits their No. 1 pick unless it falls in the top seven.
27
2
Last Week: 25		If Kyrie (shoulder sprain) doesn't play again this season -- which is the way I'd play it if I ran the Cavs -- he'll wind up with averages of 18.9 ppg, 5.7 apg and 4.0 rpg in 45 games along with nice numbers percentage-wise from the field (.471) and 3-point line (.419). Plenty, in other words, to win the ROY in a walk.
28
--

Last Week: 28		The masses rising to the Wizards' defense to shout down any delusional dreamer who suggested that John Wall and Co. couldn't beat Kentucky marked the first time folks have gotten behind the Wiz with vigor since the days of Hayes, Unseld, Dandridge and our pal Ballard. Or at least it feels like it's been that long.
29
New Orleans
13-40
3
Last Week: 26		Has to be tantalizing for the West's worst team to see Anthony Davis playing in their city ... knowing it'll have the second- or third-best lottery odds to land the No. 1 overall pick needed to draft Davis. After the Final Four? Eric Gordon finally playing again this season will have to suffice in terms of hoops excitement.
30
--

Last Week: 30		Tell us, Bobcats fans. Pleased to hear Michael Jordan emphatically shoot down a New York Daily News report about selling the team in the next few years? Or questioning His Airness' proclamation that he's "100 percent committed to building the Bobcats into a contender" via press release? Eager to hear from you.
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