As we inch just days, almost hours closer to Thursday’s NBA Trade deadline, there may be a bunch of rosters that might look a little different as it passes. Expect some circulation of news involving pieces like Clint Capela and Robert Covington as the deadline nears, but as it goes for basketball, no one is stopping the Milwaukee Bucks, now that they’ve successfully clinched a winning record on the season and surely can’t miss out on a playoff spot with the league’s best record.

Other turnaround teams like the Lakers have also matched their season-high in wins from last year, while the Utah Jazz drop four straight and fall out of the top 3 in the West after almost going undefeated since Dec. 4. It’s a game of runs and momentum going into the 16th week of competition, and for other teams like the Clippers and Celtics, that momentum is increasing more expeditiously than a bullet train.

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1. Milwaukee Bucks (42-7, Last Week’s Ranking: 1)

There are only seven games left for the Milwaukee Bucks to win in order to clinch their postseason berth, which is easier done than said when you look at these Bucks. As per usual: they’re still No.1 in defensive rating, average scoring margin and still look the part of the league’s most elite squad, now with the opportunity to maybe even beat the 2016 Warriors legendary 73-9 record. Though unlikely, those Warriors clinched in 58 games as opposed to the Bucks 49 played games this season.

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2. Los Angeles Lakers (37-11, Last Week’s Ranking: 3)

Los Angeles was able to make a somber week finish on the right note, following last week’s horrendous tragedy as the collective sporting world mourned the sudden passing of NBA legend Kobe Bryant. After postponing the game against the Clippers and replacing that televised contest on TNT with a memorial in the Staples Center, the franchise resumed basketball activities with a game against Portland, in which they let Damian Lillard honor the Mamba with a sensational 48-point performance in a loss to the Blazers. They would go on to avenge their Friday night loss with a blowout win over the Kings, but now more questions arise as their starting lineup could change with the trade deadline looming.

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3. Toronto Raptors (36-14, Last Week’s Ranking: 5)

So…it’s appropriate to admit that the Raptors are elite now even without Kawhi Leonard being on the team anymore? Nick Nurse’s squad is making that apparent, winning 11 straight games and jumping to the second seed in the Eastern standings. Oh, and they have the third-best record in the NBA! And yet, more adversity is in their path now that Norman Powell is going to miss time with a broken hand bone, so the path to keeping their upper hand in the East becomes a little steeper.

The first-time starter was averaging a little over 17 points in the 11 games played before his re-injury but keep in mind that this team has been nearly unbeatable when shifting other bodies into starting spots. Terence Davis III had a huge afternoon on Super Bowl Sunday while starting in place of Powell against the Bulls, scoring a career-high 31 points in the win.

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4. Boston Celtics (33-15, Last Week’s Ranking: 8)

If there’s anything the Celtics are proving right now, it’s that their unabashedness and confidence playing against top-tier teams in the NBA is something worth analyzing. They just keep piling on impressive win after impressive win, now with victories over teams like the Lakers, Bucks, Heat, Sixers, Nuggets, and Mavericks on the season. Just last week, they were able to conquer the Miami Heat in their own building, and then beat the Sixers in Boston without Kemba Walker. As a significant part of that offense, Jaylen Brown may have easily had his best week as a pro, averaging 25 points off 55.8 percent shooting in an undefeated week for the Celtics.

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5. Los Angeles Clippers (34-15, Last Week’s Ranking: 2)

Paul George returned from a nine-game hiatus due to tending to a hamstring injury and his Clippers were the first team to play in the Staples Center since Kobe Bryant’s passing. LA played against the Kings that night and though it was an emotional night, they still lost badly to the Sacramento Kings while they were down a starter in Kawhi Leonard who took a load management night off. They still had a 2-1 week, though they need to string together some streak of wins in a West that’s altering itself due to teams slipping in the rankings.

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6. Denver Nuggets (34-16, Last Week’s Ranking: 6)

Denver stays put in this week’s ranking but still in the top-10, thanks to a rare 127-115 road victory against the Milwaukee Bucks in the Fiserv Forum. In a week that’s still seen additional missed games from the likes of Paul Millsap, Jamal Murray, Gary Harris and Miles Plumlee, it’s second-biggest highlight was a big comeback win over the Jazz. With the streaking Trail Blazers, second matchup with the Jazz and Suns this week, Denver is looking to keep up this surge of good play from Will Barton, Nikola Jokic and the rest of Mike Malone’s bench.

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7. Houston Rockets (31-18, Last Week’s Ranking: 11)

Add the Houston Rockets to the “I survived Zion Williamson, too” list following their defensive showcase against the Pelicans on Sunday afternoon, managing to keep their leading scorer Brandon Ingram scoreless in the fourth. Also, James Harden is finally out of his shooting slump, evident to his recovery from his thigh contusion that kept him out of two games. In the most recent week of play, Harden went from shooting 22.7 percent from deep, to connecting on 13 of his last 29 attempts in their two wins over the weekend. He’s up to averaging 37.5 points per contest, after putting up career lows from his previous averages of 24.9 points per game in his previous seven games.

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8. Indiana Pacers (31-18, Last Week’s Ranking: 10)

The Pacers finally got Victor Oladipo back from his year-long rehab, and now are back in the driver’s seat of regaining pole position in the East with a perfectly healthy starting five. All Star reserve Domantas Sabonis and his Pacers are poised to overtake the second-seeded Pacers if they’re to win the next five games, and if the Raptors slip since they aren’t going to have Norman Powell for an extended amount of time. Home court advantage is still in the play of possibility, for they’ll have to scratch and claw to obtain that second seed, especially when they face the Raptors in the middle of this week’s four-game stretch.

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9. Utah Jazz (32-17, Last Week’s Ranking: 4)

The Utah Jazz are experiencing a little turbulence in their otherwise solid season, losing four-straight after previously having their way in 19 of their past 21 games. In back to back games, they let both Rockets guard Eric Gordon and Blazers All-Sar Damian Lillard snap for 50 against them, allowing a staggering average of 120.4 points from both games. That statistical anomaly keeps them out of the top-5 ranking of the best defensive teams in the league (Utah has the ninth-best defensive rating in the NBA) but there may be much more to fret about with a Nuggets team they play well against coming up next on the schedule, and Portland and Houston right after them.

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10. Miami Heat (33-15, Last Week’s Ranking: 7)

Miami is also going through a rough patch in their season after their recent 6-5 outing right after going 27-10 up until Jan. 8. Some ugly losses against sub.500 teams is normal, and likely happen once every blue moon. But you have a problem when the losing skid involves teams like the Knicks, Nets, Celtics and Clippers in the same week. Only OKC was beaten by the Heat in examining how many wins they were able to grab against teams over .500 this week and it doesn’t get any easier, now that the Sixers, Clippers (again), Kings and Trail Blazers await a Heat team that’s trying to go into All Star Break still perched amidst the top-3 in the East.

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11. Philadelphia 76ers (31-19, Last Week’s Ranking: 9)

At home, the Sixers play like the best team in the East but on the road, they look like a lottery team, now an abysmal 9-17 away from the Wells Fargo Center. Losing to the Celtics is understandable regardless if the Cs were down a point guard, but succumbing to the Hawks on the road? Well, that’s unacceptable for a team that’s looking to make splashes in the postseason. They possess the worst away record of any above .500 team this season and maybe the health of the returning Joel Embiid is a factor, but the frontcourt combination of Al Horford, Embiid and Tobias Harris needs serious evaluation. In the Saturday night loss to Boston, the trio combined for 30 points on a 9-of-34 shooting night and only one made shot from Embiid.

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12. Dallas Mavericks (30-19, Last Week’s Record: 12)

Dallas is another team that stays put in this week’s rankings. They are 3-3 in the games that Luka Doncic doesn’t play and fought with all their might against the Rockets in Friday’s loss, but they need some consistent offense from their backcourt now that it’s being reported that Doncic is to miss at least five more games due to letting his sprained ankle heal. In his place is his European companion Kristaps Porzingis has averaged 24.5 points per game and a little over 13 rebounds in the games Doncic has been out.

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13. Oklahoma City Thunder (30-20, Last Week’s Ranking: 13)

As the Thunder have played the most games of anyone in the month of January, they went a head-turning 12-5, and got Chris Paul back into the All Star Game. They’re just a game fifth place in the difficult West, and that’s amazing considering they’re playing with a core composed off youth and aging veteran pieces. Since Thanksgiving, they’re 24-9, which is the second-best win-loss ratio since then. OKC is still climbing atop the West in a season many prognosticated as a reboulding year of supplying picks and building draft capital.

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14. Portland Trail Blazers (23-27, Last Week’s Ranking: 19)

Damian Lillard might be the best player in the NBA right now, and it’s beginning to finally rub off on the parts around him. The Blazers are 4-2 after Lillard deciced to go apesh-you get it- on the last six teams he and his team faced in the past two weeks, and his numbers in those games sound a little like this: 61, 47, 50, 36, 48, 51. Whoa. He’s pulling up from 40 feet as if it’s second nature and he’s getting his with straight jumpers and dribble drives to the cup, and there hasn’t been a defense that’s been able to stick him just yet. He’s doing whatever it takes to get the Blazers back into the playoffs and in the crossfires of their pursuit of a playoff record are teams like the Grizzlies, who look as if they could lose that eighth seed to the Blazers if they’re not careful.

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15. Memphis Grizzlies (24-25, Last Week’s Ranking: 14)

Memphis put up the third-best record in the month of January with their 11 wins and four losses, and while led by Dillon Brooks, the Grizzlies backcourt has done an excellent job in supplying proficienct shooting percentages from dowtown and floor spacing that Ja Morant doesn’t have to create all the time. Brooks has flown under the radar made by the Morant hype train, but has averaged a team-high 20.5 points and 45 percent shooting percentage from three. They’re 17-1 whenever Brooks drops 20 in a game, and with Detroit, Dallas and Washington this week, that record could improve as all three of those teams struggle with stopping shooting guards from scoring in multitudes.

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16. San Antonio Spurs (22-26, Last Week’s Ranking: 15)

DeMar DeRozan is to miss out on the All Star festivities in Chicago in the coming weeks, but has put up All-Star-esque numbers in what’s turning out to be a solid 2019-20 campaign for the former USC Trojan. His 23 points per game is already the third-best average he’s put up in his 10-year career, but this time he’s doing it efficiently at a 53.8 field goal percentage (the best shooting percentage of his career). He’s starting to look like the player that cracked the top-3 in MVP voting back in 2018, and considerably so now that his Spurs are only four games away from having a .500 record again.

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17. Brooklyn Nets (21-27, Last Week’s Ranking: 17)

Kyrie Irving came back into the starting lineup and dropped a season-high 54 points against the visiting Chicago Bulls, only a night after dropping 20-5-5 in a win over the Pistons. The Nets were staring 3-0 on the week in a matchup with the Wizards, until Irving was knee-locked with a Wizards defender and left with a knee injury with 5:31 remaining in the fourth quarter. Flustered by the second loss of Irving on the season, the Nets couldn’t make a shot in the fourth quarter and ultimately lost to Washington in the game’s final four minutes. It is being reported that Irving is going to be re-evaluated in a week’s time, meaning that Caris LeVert and Spencer Dinwiddie (who’s struggled mightily after Irving’s return) to step up big if they want to hold on to that seventh seed that they’re only a game in front of the Orlando Magic for.

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18. Orlando Magic (21-28, Last Week’s Ranking: 16)

The Magic are a polarizing team; they beat lowly, sub .500 teams without issue but when it comes to facing fellow teams that are also playoff locks, they can’t get the job done. They’re a combined 5-22 in games against over-.500 teams, and to make things worse, they’ve now dropped five straight. The Knicks and Hornets are on the list this week but conversely, so are the Celtics and Bucks.

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19. Phoenix Suns (20-29, Last Week’s Ranking: 18)

The Suns drop a spot in this week’s rankings, and we know one thing: it certainly isn’t Devin Booker, who was snubbed again from making the All-Star game. It looks like he’s taking that anger and aggression out on the court, averaging nearly 30 points in the two games he’s played since hearing the news that he wasn’t selected to get an All-Star selection. At this point, it’s unknown as to what he has to do to gain the voters’ respect to just get into one All Star Game, since he’s the only player in the league to score north of 27 points per game off 60 percent True Shooting.

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20. New Orleans Pelicans (20-30, Last Week’s Ranking: 20)

The Pelicans haven’t figured out the puzzle of keeping a win streak alive while letting Zion Williamson run rampant on every defense he sees, as they’ve gone a combined 3-3 since his debut. Williamson is becoming what everyone though he’d be at the next level: a highlight machine that can score an inordinate amount of points, no matter how many minutes Alvin Gentry feels comfortable keeping the Pelicans No. 1 pick on the floor. Of course, his 61.5 field percentage is backed up by his 11 dunks in his first six games and his advanced ability to finish at the rim.

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21. Chicago Bulls (19-33, Last Week’s Ranking: 21)

The Bulls are a banged up bunch that, again, is starting to lose trust in Jim Boylen’s rotations and decision-making. The injury bug has now taken Kris Dunn as its latest victim, and the Bulls will be without him for an undisclosed amount of time due to the former Providence guard spraining his MCL in Friday’s loss the the Nets on the road. Additionally, Daniel Gafford is going to miss some time from a nasty fall against the Raptors on Sunday and Lauri Markkanen won’t see the court for a while due to a pelvis ailment.

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22. Sacramento Kings (18-31, Last Week’s Ranking: 23)

Marvin Bagley III has only played four games since December 26 due to what’s being described as a mid-foot sprain, and because of his injury, will miss the Rising Stars Challenge on Feb. 14. The former Duke Blue Devil and top 3 pick has averaged 14.2 points per game and 7.5 rebounds in his short season. Without him, the tasks of beating Minnesota, Miami and San Antonio just got that much harder.

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23. Washington Wizards (17-31, Last Week’s Ranking: 24)

You gotta love the parity of the NBA. The league’s worst defensive team…is only three games away from a playoff spot. The Washington Wizards, now winners of two straight, are actually in contention for a playoff berth between them and the Orlando Magic, who have lost five straight games. Bradley Beal is leading the charge with his 28.8 points per game and though another All Star snub, is willing his Wizards back into the conversation of the eight best teams in the East.

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24. Detroit Pistons (18-33, Last Week’s Ranking: 22)

Andre Drummond and Derrick Rose could be moved ahead of Thursday’s trade deadline. But for the right price, that is. Detroit is a team many have their eyes on in the next four days, as many wonder if they’ll work with their core of the guys that are already there, of if they’ll just blow up the roster and get rid of the stars they already have, now that they’re a full four games out of the playoff hunt with no apparent desire to win the eighth or seventh seed.

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25. Charlotte Hornets (16-33, Last Week’s Ranking: 25)

If there’s any consolation for this season, it’s that the trio of Devonte’ Graham, Miles Bridges, and PJ Washington are a future worth building around. All three will showcase their skills on the national stage in the Rising Stars Challenge during All-Star Weekend, but in assessing the team, the Hornets have only won 3 games in the month of January and are a season-low 17 games below .500.

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26. Minnesota Timberwolves (15-33, Last Week’s Ranking: 26)

Karl Anthony-Towns and the Timberwolves together have not won a game since November 27, 2019, since his return to the hardwood. What looked like a streak-breaker against the Sacramento Kings this week turned out to be a blown 27-point lead and loss in OT, causing more contempt and queasiness for Wolves fans who only want to see their team get a win. They might have a shot at redemption against the Kings again on Monday and a chance at a winning streak against the Hawks a night later, for it’s likely Trae Young won’t suit up for that game.

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27. New York Knicks (14-36, Last Week’s Ranking: 27)

Saturday night was a positive for the Knicks, as they found a way to knock off the Pacers, but of course, most positives come after negatives, and how much more negative can you get than a 127-106 loss in the Garden to the Memphis Grizzlies where the game didn’t garner as many headlines as previously suspected. Elfrid Payton took matters into his own hands following some unsportsmanlike actions involving Jae Crowder stealing an inbounds pass and hoisting up a three with virtually no time on the clock while up 21, in which Crowder decided to shove Crowder into the front row as a bench-clearing brawl ensued.

After the game, possible tradee Marcus Morris Jr. called Crowder’s actions “female tendencies”, which, obviously met discomfort and disagreement among folks on Twitter. Payton, who was also ejected from the brawl, received a one-game suspension while Morris received a lengthy fine.

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28. Cleveland Cavaliers (13-37, Last Week’s Ranking: 28)

Cleveland is likely to be high-sellers come the trade deadline on Thursday, and since they’ve seemingly given up trying to compete in this already-lost season, names like Tristan Thompson and Kevin Love are probably the first of many to go. Koby Altman is expected to be really aggressive in both trades and free agency in the offseason, as there are multiple expiring veteran contracts on the team that need to be dealt with.

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29. Golden State Warriors (11-39, Last Week’s Ranking: 29)

Though he’d probably provide some highlights on a season that’a already compromised, Stephen Curry returning to the active lineup does little to nothing to help their odds to improve their draft lottery positioning. But, it may be worth seeing how D’Angelo Russell and Curry collaborate on the floor when they share it for an extended period of time as Curry’s return date is in early March.

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30. Atlanta Hawks (13-37, Last Week’s Ranking: 30)

Trae Young’s All-Star debut is worth the wait, although the guard suffered a right ankle sprain against the Mavericks last Saturday in the game’s third quarter. This season is a lost cause, so it’s more than likely the Hawks play this injury cautiously so that he won’t have to miss the All-Star festivities coming up in two weeks.