The first two NBA Cup quarterfinals are set, with Miami going to Orlando and New York going to Toronto.
And the defending Cup champions won’t have a chance to go back-to-back.
New York got the last of the four available berths in the Eastern Conference on Friday night, topping the reigning Cup champion Milwaukee Bucks 118-109 to win East Group C. The Bucks’ loss prevented them from moving on to the quarterfinals.
“I told the guys they did a heck of a job finding a way,” Knicks coach Mike Brown said.
Toronto won East Group A, Orlando won East Group B, and both did so with 4-0 records. The Knicks went 3-1 in Group C and finished on top because they held the head-to-head tiebreaker over Miami, which also finished 3-1.
The quarterfinal games will be played either Dec. 9 or Dec. 10. The Magic won their group with a 112-109 victory over Detroit on Friday night — and as the top seed, they will play the wild-card Heat.
“We’re so happy to be home,” Magic coach Jamahl Mosley said. “We have some of the best fans in the NBA. They’re going to be back there, supporting us, ready to go. … For us to do this is very special for our guys right now.”
The Heat-Magic and Knicks-Raptors games will create a bit of a schedule quirk. The quarterfinal games count toward the regular season, so Miami and Orlando will wind up playing five times this season — the first time that’s happened since 1993-94 — and the Knicks and Raptors will meet five times as well. The Heat play a regular-season game at Orlando on Dec. 5, their second time there this season, then will go back for a Cup quarterfinal a few days later.
“It’s great,” Orlando’s Desmond Bane said when told the Magic got a home Cup quarterfinal. “We’re building. We’re building something special.”
The three remaining Cup quarterfinal spots in the Western Conference were also being decided on Friday night. The Los Angeles Lakers — who won the inaugural Cup in 2023 — were the only West team to be assured of a quarterfinal spot going into Friday.
What happens next
The 22 teams that miss the quarterfinals will all have two regular-season games added to their schedules in the coming days, to push their total to the full 82. All teams entered the season with only 80 games on the calendar to allow for what happens in the NBA Cup.
Those additional regular-season games for those 22 teams — one will be home, one will be on the road — will be scheduled for Dec. 11, Dec. 12, Dec. 14 or Dec. 15.
For the teams that move on, the quarterfinals become game No. 81. The teams that lose in the quarterfinals will play the other quarterfinal loser from their conference, filling out the remaining game on their schedule.
The semifinals are in Las Vegas on Dec. 13 and those games will also count toward the regular-season standings. The championship game — which doesn’t count in the standings — is in Las Vegas on Dec. 16.
Money matters
Players on the quarterfinal teams will each get $53,903. The payout increases to $106,187 for berths in the semifinals, $212,373 for a spot in the final — and $530,933 for each player on the winning team.
Two-way players will receive half those amounts, if applicable.
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AP NBA: https://apnews.com/hub/NBA
Tim Reynolds, The Associated Press
