What To Watch For In The NBA Cup Semifinals

The NBA Cup is down to four teams.

Rebranded as the Emirates NBA Cup in its third year, the mid-season competition was Adam Silver’s brain child to add more excitement to the front half of the NBA calendar. The tournament has a group stage featuring all 30 teams in six groups. After four games the six group winners – plus two wild cards – are locked into the elimination rounds.

This year the Group Play attracted 40 million viewers across Amazon Prime, NBC and ESPN which is up 90 percent from last year. But the jury is still out on whether or not fans are really invested. A quick Google search and you’ll find a sea of links to stories asking Are fans really into the cup and Is the NBA Cup exciting? The premise that you need a tournament this early in a new NBA season still hasn’t fully caught on but fans might be coming around to the idea. For the players it’s still not the NBA Championship. Remember the Bucks opting to not celebrate the cup win last year?

The 30-team race has now been shaved down to four teams. Some of last year’s playoff teams failed to make it through to the elimination rounds. The Pacers and Celtics were missing Tyrese Haliburton and Jayson Tatum. The Bucks and Timberwolves offered middling form. And teams like the Warriors (1-3) and Rockets (2-2) couldn’t win when they needed to.

As the Magic and Knicks prepare to face off, and the Spurs lock in against a red-hot Oklahoma City Thunder, these are the players to watch, how they got here and where you can see the Semifinals that kick off tomorrow in Las Vegas.

Orlando Magic Vs. New York Knicks At 5:30 p.m. ET

NBA Cup record: The Magic haven’t lost a game yet and are sitting on 5-0. They beat the Pistons, Sixers, Nets, Celtics and Heat with an average winning margin of 14.6. The Knicks lost to the Bulls by 10 in their cup run and comfortably beat the Raptors in the Quarterfinal by 16 to go 4-1.

What to watch: For the Magic the big question is can Desmond Bane keep showing up to cover the injury to Franz Wagner and Paolo Banchero’s limited minutes? Bane has scored 37 points three times in his last six games and the Magic have gone 4-2. If the Knicks stifle him, the Magic will be looking for additional scoring from the likes of Jalen Suggs, Tristan da Silva and Anthony Black. The Magic rank just 19th in three-point percentage and 22nd in three-point attempts. Offensively, they’ll need to ramp up their long range shooting to keep up with the Knicks. The good news is that defensively they are ranked 4th in the NBA. That should make life hard for the Knicks. But can they score enough?

Against the Raptors in the Quarterfinal, it looked like things were starting to click for the Knicks. Jalen Brunson and his two-way connection with Karl-Anthony Towns was firing – the former was deadly with his pull up jumper with 35 points (13-of-19 from the field) and six-from-nine from long range. Their starting five poured in 98 points out of 117 which included a long list of scorers in OG Anunoby, Josh Hart, Mikal Bridges and Jordan Clarkson. The Knicks will lean in hard on their offensive switches, spacing and schemes being the third best NBA team for offense (122.7) and sixth best three point shooting team (37.8 percent).

The pick: New York by 10 points. Timing is everything. The Knicks have hit form at the right time. At this point in the season they have hit form: they have won 15 of their last 19 games. The Knicks are also playing the Magic at a time where they don’t have Wagner, who is a key cog and heavy scorer.

San Antonio Spurs Vs. Oklahoma City Thunder At 9 p.m. ET

NBA Cup record: The Spurs haven’t had their nuclear weapon in Victor Wembanyama since Nov.15 which makes the wins against the Nuggets (3 points), Blazers (13 points), Rockets (11) and Lakers impressive. They take a 4-1 record into this bout with the Thunder who are undefeated so far with 5-0. It must be noted that, two of those wins were against NBA easy beats the Utah Jazz (32 points) and Sacramento Kings (31 points) who have won eight and six games respectively.

What to watch: What makes this match up more spicy is that reports say Wembanyama could return for Saturday. If that happens that would give the Spurs a fighting chance.

But let’s be real. This is still a David versus Goliath battle. The Thunder have been ruthless this year: their only loss was against the Trailblazers by two points on Nov. 5. The Spurs, who are ranked 15th for defense in the NBA have the arduous challenge of stopping a Thunder team in every aspect of basketball who boast a net rating of 17.2, the best in the league.

One of the bright spots for the Spurs this year has been the sharp development of Dylan Harper. He’s averaging 13.4 points on 48 percent shooting from the field. The 19-year-old looks to be a future cornerstone piece for the franchise. He shot 22 points against the Pelicans on 62.5 percent field goal shooting and 13 points against the Lakers in 20 minutes. He looks confident and plays the game with no fear.

The Thunder have the MVP of last year in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander who is averaging 32.6 in 24 games this season. He led the onslaught against the Suns as the Thunder ran riot with a 49 point win in the NBA Cup Quarterfinal. No player on the roster played more than 27 minutes in that game. So they are fresh. And they are winning without Gilgeous-Alexander having to log crazy minutes. For the neutral fan, one thing to watch is how Thunder head coach Mark Daigneault shuffles his rotations. On any given night the bench becomes a real driving force for defensive energy and catch-and-shoot threes. Guys like Ajay Mitchell, Jaylin Williams, Aaron Wiggins, Branden Carlson, and Kenrich Williams are the long line of jack-of-all trade impact players.

The pick: Thunder by 15 points. The fact is the Thunder are operating on a level above the NBA. They are currently on a 16-game winning streak with a healthy MVP playing at a ridiculously high standard. They are the best defensive team. And their coach is strategically ahead of the game.

How You Can Watch The NBA Cup Semifinals

Prime Video will stream the playoff cup games as well as the Championship Final on Dec.16. You can also watch it through a list of options including NBA League Pass, Youtube, ESPN, NBC and more.