Northwest Division Final 2024 Grades

The 2024 NBA Finals are set and will feature the Dallas Mavericks taking on the Boston Celtics in the final best of seven series of the year. At this point in the year, the 28 other teams in the league have nothing to do but watch the Finals and reflect on their season. Ironically, the teams of the Northwest Division are all sitting at home despite being the best division by overall record in the entire league. That isn’t to say that the teams were an overall failure, as all of them with the exception of the Denver Nuggets didn’t enter the season with the end goal of taking home a championship. That being said, here are the final grades for each Northwest Division team now that their playoff runs have come to an end.

Oklahoma City Thunder

Grade: A+

The Thunder entered this season tempering expectations of improvement after making a play-in tournament appearance last year. General manager Sam Presti said as much during his pre-season press conference, saying that the young team needed to quote “finish eating their breakfast first” before moving on to bigger things. Clearly this team, led by MVP runner-up Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Coach of the Year Mark Daignault were hungry for success, leading Oklahoma City to the top seed in one of the most competitive Western Conferences in many years thanks to balanced play on both ends and the emergence of rookie center Chet Holmgren as the team’s anchor on both ends while SGA led the team throughout the season. The team’s second round playoff loss in six games to the Dallas Mavericks might leave a sour taste in their mouths, but the team appears set to compete at a high level for many years to come.

Denver Nuggets

Grade: B+

The Nuggets entered the season as the defending champions, coming off of one of the more dominant postseasons that has been seen in the post Kevin Durant Warriors era, and the team was heavily favored to repeat as champs thanks to the dominance of Nikola Jokić. Halfway through the regular season, however, concerns began to arise about the team’s lack of urgency when it came to securing the top spot in the West. Jokić and company quickly silenced those critiques, embarking on a dominant second half of the season and ending tied with the Thunder for the best record in the conference, albeit accepting the second seed in the playoffs thanks to a tiebreaker the Thunder held over them. The team dispatched the Los Angeles Lakers in the first round, but fell short against the Minnesota Timberwolves in round two. The season overall was a success, but the fact that this grade is not higher is simply an effect of the lofty expectations put on this team after last season’s success.

Minnesota Timberwolves

Grade: A-

When the Timberwolves made their blockbuster trade almost two years ago to acquire then three-time NBA Defensive Player of the Year Rudy Gobert from the Utah Jazz, many said that they gave up too much and the only way that the trade could be seen as a success would be if Minnesota took home the Larry O’Brien trophy as a result. Fast forward two seasons and the Wolves made their deepest playoff run in more than 20 years on the backs of Anthony Edwards, Karl-Anthony Towns and 2024 Defensive Player of the Year Gobert, falling to the Dallas Mavericks in five games in the Western Conference Finals. Fans blamed the loss on a lack of aggression from the team’s stars, but a deeper dive shows that the team’s flaws truly show in their youth and lack of experience, especially in the playoffs. The loss to the Mavericks is going to burn for a while, but if ownership is willing to spend enough money to keep the team together, the group can make big strides in the right direction moving forward.

Utah JazZ

Grade: C

The Jazz are at a crucial point when it comes to the direction that their franchise is going to take moving forward. This season, they somewhat sat steady when it came to making deals at the deadline, only moving Kelly Olynyk and Ochai Agbaji to the Toronto Raptors for Otto Porter Jr. and Kira Lewis. The team finished more than 10 games under the .500 mark, but general manager Justin Zanik has said that he likes the players the team has now and believes that they can make a jump next season. This might be a good time to take a step back and realize how difficult the West is right now. Teams have recently shown that rebuilds don’t need to last for too long and won’t doom a franchise, but being in the black hole of mediocrity could end poorly(just ask the Chicago Bulls).

Portland Trail Blazers

Grade: C-

The Portland Trail Blazers entered this season still reeling from having to trade franchise legend Damian Lillard to the Milwaukee Bucks, scrambling to try to get the most out of him as they tried to move forward. The good news? They were able to secure Scoot Henderson, who they hope will take Lillard’s place and help the team return to competition. Henderson slowly improved throughout the season, learning the speed of the NBA game and taking strides in his playmaking and rebounding. However, head coach Chauncey Billups made some interesting rotation decisions, giving more minutes to the veterans on his roster instead of allowing younger players to accumulate playing time and make mistakes that they can improve on in the offseason. Needless to say, the team has shown flashes of what they are capable of, so not all is lost for the Blazers moving forward.