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Top 10 storylines for the 2017 NBA Finals

NBA Finals NBA MVP LeBron James Kevin Durant Golden State Warriors Cleveland Cavaliers

10. The greatest of all-time?

Will these Warriors go down as the greatest of all-time should they handle the Cavaliers in the Finals.

Golden State heads into the Finals having won 27 of its past 28 games. The team has lost a grand total of one game since March 11th. The three-time defending Western Conference champs are also the first team in NBA history to head into the Finals with a perfect 12-0 mark. Add in the fact that they’re winning by an average of nearly 17 points per game, and the domination has been real here.

If the Warriors make short work of Cleveland (as some suggest will happen), is this the greatest team in the history of the Association? Think about it this way. Golden State has won 67-plus games in each of the past three seasons. During that span, Steve Kerr’s squad boasts an absurd 207-39 regular season mark.

To put this into perspective, those 37 losses would have earned Golden State a spot in the playoffs in both conferences this season alone.

The numbers really are staggering when you look at them in context. Golden State finished the regular season No. 1 in the NBA at 115.9 points per game. It was also first in offensive efficiency and second in defensive efficiency. Draymond Green is the likely NBA Defensive Player of the Year and Kevin Durant upped his game to elite levels on that end of the court.

None of this has really changed in the playoffs. In fact, the Warriors are coming off a four-game sweep of the Spurs that saw them put up 120-plus points in each of the past three games. In total, Golden State averaged 122 points per game in the Western Conference Finals. That came on the heels of the team averaging 111 points in the semifinals and 120 points in the first round.

Should the Warriors handle business against Cleveland in the Finals for the second time in three years, a real argument could be made that this is the best team to ever play. It sounds like hyperbole, but the numbers sure do back up that sentiment. At the very least, it’s a debate that will rival what we are seeing with LeBron James and Michael Jordan right now.

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