Boston is led by the star duo of Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown, but also has several players capable of 30-plus-point outings like Derrick White and Kristaps Porziņģis. It's hard to argue that there is a team deeper than the Celtics this year.

The season before that, No. 2 Boston faced No. 8 Miami in the East, and No. 1 Denver faced the No. 7 Los Angeles Lakers in the West. In fact, the 1-seed in both conferences combined has only made the conference finals four times, dating back to 2020 (2024 Boston, 2023 Denver, 2022 Miami, 2020 Los Angeles Lakers).

SportsLine's model simulated Memphis Grizzlies vs. Golden State Warriors 10,000 times and revealed its NBA picks for Tuesday's Western Conference Play-In Tournament matchup