While the Maine Celtics had two chances to clinch the G League title, they fell just one win short of winning it all. The Celtics were blown out by the Oklahoma City Blue 117-100 in Game 3 of the G League Finals, losing the series 2-1, in Portland, Maine, on Monday.

Initially, the C’s and Blue were in a tight battle throughout the first half. But the Blue blew it open late in the second quarter, building up a commanding 63-40 halftime lead. Oklahoma City never allowed the Celtics to get back into the game, cruising to its first-ever G League title.

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Two-way guard JD Davison led the way with 22 points, 10 assists and four steals in the losing effort. Joe Wieskamp and two-way forward Drew Peterson had 13 points each. Neemias Queta and Jordan Walsh, both of whom are on standard NBA contracts, had eight points and nine points, respectively.

Notably, the four Celtics who can be with the main team have had a busy several days. They played six games in nine days, spanning both the NBA and G League level. The NBA Celtics had two games to close out their regular season without any of their starters playing. So it meant they actually needed the G League players to soak up some minutes. That was some extra wear and tear, but that’s life in the pros as they balanced those valuable NBA minutes and a G League playoff run.

While the Celtics fell in Game 3 of the G League Finals, it was an overall successful season to get to this point. They were the No. 2 seed in the East, earning a first-round bye. They then beat reigning champs Delaware Blue Coats in the East semifinals; they downed the Long Island Nets in the East Finals. Every round of the G League playoffs is single elimination, except for the best-of-three G League Finals.

It looked like the Celtics were in control after a comfortable Game 1 win in Portland, Maine, where they cruised to a 106-86 home victory. But the Blue stormed back in Game 2, and while the Celtics had their chances late, Maine fell 99-89. That set the stage for the winner-take-all Game 3 on Monday, but the C’s weren’t able to get the job done on their home court, where they had been undefeated in the playoffs.

The Oklahoma City Thunder settled a historic contest for the top seed in the Western Conference on the final day of the NBA's regular season.

For the first time in the NBA, three teams had the same record after 81 games at the top of their conference.

The Thunder thrashed the Dallas Mavericks 135-86 to clinch top spot heading into the play-offs.

Defending champions the Denver Nuggets also won to seal the second seed while the Minnesota Timberwolves lost.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 15 points in just 15 minutes as Thunder thumped a Dallas team that rested most of their starters, with their play-off position having already been set - fifth in the Western Conference.

That meant Oklahoma City ended the regular season with a 57-25 record and a five-game winning streak to finish top of their conference for the first time since the 2012-13 season.

Denver beat the Memphis Grizzlies 126-111 to match a franchise high for wins (57-25) but the Thunder came out on top because of a head-to-head tie-breaker.

Minnesota had to settle for the third seed after losing 125-106 at home to the Phoenix Suns, who moved past New Orleans to secure the sixth seed in the Western Conference, following the Pelicans' 124-108 loss to the Los Angeles Lakers.

That meant Phoenix earned an automatic spot in the play-offs while New Orleans will have to play two games in the play-in tournament this week to secure their place in the post-season.

It is as you were for much of the Eastern Conference, where the Boston Celtics had run away with it. They rested most of their starters but still beat the Washington Wizards 132-122 to finish with the NBA's beat record (64-18), with Payton Pritchard scoring a career-high 38 points.

The Orlando Magic, Indiana Pacers and Philadelphia 76ers all went into the final day level (46-35), with the Miami Heat one win behind.

All won on Sunday so remain in the same positions from seeds five to eight, meaning the 76ers and Heat have to face the play-in tournament.

But Jalen Brunson scored 40 points as the New York Knicks beat the Chicago Bulls 120-119 in overtime to take the second seed from the Milwaukee Bucks, who were thumped 113-88 by the Orlando Magic.

The 2024 NBA playoff field is now set, here's who had good and bad days on Sunday

Fifteen different seeds were decided on the final day of the 2023-24 NBA season, and the complete postseason field is now set after a busy, 15-game day across the league. The Oklahoma City Thunder clinched the No. 1 seed in the West with a blowout win over the Dallas Mavericks. The New York Knicks moved up to the No. 2 seed in the East with an overtime win, while the Milwaukee Bucks were blown out in Orlando and fell to No. 4 in the East.

Here's a complete look at the 2024 NBA playoff picture, and the postseason will get started on Tuesday with the Play-In Tournament.

Notable Sunday NBA scores

With the bracket now set, here are the winners and losers of the regular season's final day:

Winner: Oklahoma City Thunder

Home-court advantage didn't mean all that much to the Denver Nuggets. They just went 6-3 on the road en route to their first championship last season. The Timberwolves, who had the NBA's second-best road record this season at 26-15, probably don't mind playing road games either. If any of the top three Western Conference teams should have wanted the top seed most, it was Oklahoma City.

The Thunder tied Denver for the Western Conference's best home record at 33-8, but more importantly, this group is woefully devoid of playoff experience. The Thunder's starting lineup has combined to play a total of 627 postseason minutes in their entire careers. Key reserves Cason Wallace, Aaron Wiggins and Jaylin Williams have never played postseason basketball either, and sixth man Isaiah Joe has played only 24 garbage-time minutes in the playoffs. By earning home-court advantage, the Thunder have not only managed to avoid Denver in the first two rounds, but ensured that if they do face the champs, Game 7 will be in their building. Teams this young need all of the help they can get in the playoffs, and the Thunder set themselves up for a real run by securing the No. 1 seed.

Loser: Minnesota Timberwolves

On Jan. 22, the Timberwolves built an 18-point second-half lead on the Charlotte Hornets at home. They frittered that lead away trying to get Karl-Anthony Towns to 70 points. He finished with 62, but the Timberwolves lost to one of the worst teams in the NBA. That one game was the difference between Minnesota finishing with the No. 1 seed and the No. 3 seed. The margins were truly that thin this year. Every game counted.

Now, the Timberwolves have to face a Suns team in the first round that they haven't beaten all year. Phoenix has weaknesses, but the Timberwolves aren't built to exploit them. Any team with proper spacing should be able to pace-and-space Jusuf Nurkic into oblivion, and perhaps the Wolves can still do so with Karl-Anthony Towns and Naz Reid's shooting, but this isn't a roster designed to spam high pick-and-roll as, say, the Thunder or Mavericks can. The Suns can match Minnesota's bulk inside with Nurkic and control the terms of engagement offensively by simply running their offense through the star Jaden McDaniels and Anthony Edwards aren't guarding.

Winner: New York Knicks

There was plenty of talk during Sunday's Knicks win over the Bulls about how New York would have been better off losing and falling to No. 3. They'd then be facing the Indiana Pacers in the first round, a theoretically easier opponent than whoever emerges between the Philadelphia 76ers and Miami Heat in the play-in round. Tom Thibodeau doesn't play that way. The Knicks were so committed to beating Chicago that Donte DiVincenzo played more than 52 minutes in the overtime victory.

In the process, the Knicks not only locked up their first 50-win season in more than a decade, but set themselves up for a real run at the Eastern Conference Finals. They'll host whoever they face in the first two rounds, and if Giannis Antetokounmpo comes back healthy, the Knicks will need every edge they can get against a team that has beaten them three times this season. The Knicks are obviously facing an uphill battle to reach the Finals. Everyone in the East is. That's the reality a 64-win Celtics team creates. But if the Celtics suffer an injury? The Knicks have suddenly positioned themselves as the simplest replacement as the favorite in the Eastern Conference. Even if they do get knocked off by the Celtics, a run to the Eastern Conference Finals in itself, especially considering the absence of Julius Randle, would make this season an unmitigated success.

Loser: Philadelphia 76ers

The NBA's longest active winning streak belongs to the 76ers. They ended the season on an eight-game winning streak. It took them from No. 8 in the Eastern Conference all the way up to No. 7. Had Giannis Antetokounmpo not gotten injured earlier in the week, it is possible, and perhaps probable, that Orlando would have lost on Sunday and vaulted the 76ers into the top six. Instead, their winning streak buys them a date with old friend Jimmy Butler, who just loves harassing them and Tobias Harris after they infamously let him go in the summer of 2019. Win that game and they face a Knicks team with more size to throw at Joel Embiid than perhaps anyone else in the conference. Lose and your best-case scenario is a date with the 64-18 Celtics. Not a great Sunday for Philadelphia.

Winner: Los Angeles Lakers

When the Lakers lost to the Warriors on Tuesday, it looked like they were destined to fall to No. 10 in the West. The Memphis Grizzlies, missing 13 players, did everything in their power to push them back there on Friday, but the Lakers escaped with one of their hardest wins of the season. To go from those lows to the top-eight has to be treated as an enormous win for Los Angeles. The Lakers now have two chances to reach the playoffs, and they're playing against a Pelicans team they've outscored by 57 points this season. However...

Loser: Los Angeles Lakers

Guess who awaits the Lakers if they manage to beat the Pelicans on Tuesday? That's right, it's their old nemesis, the Denver Nuggets, who have beaten them eight times in a row. If the Nuggets had taken care of business against the Spurs on Friday, the Lakers wouldn't have to worry about the Nuggets. The Lakers could theoretically avoid them by making the playoffs as the No. 8 seed, but remember, they're winless against the Kings this season and Anthony Davis is winless against Domantas Sabonis for their entire careers. Amazingly, a date with Stephen Curry might actually be the preferable option. Couple that with the back spasms Davis suffered on Sunday, and the Lakers aren't in quite as strong a position as they would have hoped getting up to No. 8 would have created.

Winner: Dallas Mavericks and Los Angeles Clippers

The Lakers were the big losers of Denver's tumble. The Mavericks and Clippers were the big winners. We've already seen these two teams face off in the playoffs twice. Both series were evenly matched and exhausting. No matter who wins, neither would have been especially well-positioned to challenge the Nuggets if Denver had retained the No. 1 seed. That is especially true for the Clippers, who have lost 12 of the last 16 games they've played against Nikola Jokic. The Thunder aren't exactly a walk in the park, but there isn't a team in the field that wouldn't take them over the Nuggets as an opponent. The defending champs terrify the entire league. The Thunder haven't earned that respect yet.

Loser: New Orleans Pelicans

The Pelicans could have won their way into the No. 6 seed. Instead, they fall down to the play-in, where they face a Lakers team that has embarrassed them in virtually every high-profile game they've played. The Lakers waxed them by 44 in the In-Season Tournament and then dominated them again on Sunday. There was a real chance the Pelicans could have climbed as high as No. 4 as recently as a few weeks ago. Today, they're trapped in play-in purgatory against the one team they didn't want to face there.

As the final moments wound down in a 135-86 win over the Dallas Mavericks, jubilant standing Oklahoma City Thunder fans celebrated a team that went from winning 24 games two seasons ago to having the best record in the Western Conference this time around. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 15 points in one half of action, and the Thunder dominated a depleted Dallas squad on Sunday to secure the No 1 seed in the Western Conference playoffs.

Oklahoma City finished with the same 57-25 record as the Denver Nuggets but own the tiebreaker. The Thunder hadn’t finished as the top seed since the 2012-13 season and hadn’t been to the playoffs since the 2019-20 season.

“We all know what got us to this point,” Gilgeous-Alexander said. “Just doubling down on that and keeping our heads down and trusting the work. We got this far for a reason. Just don’t veer off of it.”

Thunder coach Mark Daigneault said he is proud of a squad that began the season as the third-youngest team in the league.

“Nothing’s guaranteed in any year, so, to be a postseason team, to be a one seed — we don’t take that for granted at all,” he said. “We’re incredibly excited. And now it’s just a matter of letting it rip with that opportunity.”

Daigneault said now that the youth won’t matter going forward.

“We’re zero and zero when we wake up tomorrow morning for the playoffs,” Daigneault said. “So what we’ve accomplished to this point doesn’t impact that. But I do think we’ve built great habits. We’ve done it together. Again, I have a lot of confidence, but not because of our age ... but because of how the guys have performed and the things they’ve built together.”

The Thunder entered the day in a three-way tie with the Nuggets and Timberwolves for the best record in the Western Conference. It was the first time in NBA history that three teams entered the final day of the season tied for a conference lead. They were able to claim the top seed despite Gilgeous-Alexander missing six games late in the season with a bruised right thigh.

The Thunder will have to wait for the play-in tournament ’s conclusion to learn their first-round opponent.

Elsewhere on Sunday, the postseason picture was set. On Tuesday, the Los Angeles Lakers face the Pelicans for a No 7 seed in the Western Conference, then the Golden State Warriors and the Sacramento Kings in an elimination game. On Wednesday, it’s the Miami Heat going to Philadelphia to decide the No 7 seed in the Eastern Conference, followed by Atlanta at Chicago in a win-or-else matchup.

“Look, this is the best time of year,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “These kind of environments, the games, the context ... you can’t expect it to be easy.”

Of the 20 postseason seeds, 15 were decided on Sunday, as were three of the four play-in matchups and three of the four first-round series that don’t include play-in teams.

The final order in the East: Boston, New York, Milwaukee, Cleveland, Orlando, Indiana, Philadelphia, Miami, Chicago and Atlanta. In the West, the order from No 1 to No 10 is Oklahoma City, Denver, Minnesota, the Los Angeles Clippers, Dallas, Phoenix, New Orleans, the Lakers, Sacramento and Golden State.

The only first-round series that was set before Sunday was Clippers-Mavericks in the West. Added to the list now: Bucks-Pacers and Cavaliers-Magic in the East, along with Timberwolves-Suns in the West.

The games themselves didn’t bring much drama on the regular season’s final day. Of the 15 games, only one was decided by one possession – and it was at Madison Square Garden, where New York got a big win. The Knicks held off Chicago 120-119 in overtime, a result that let them leapfrog Milwaukee for No.2 in the East.

“A hell of a regular season,” Knicks guard Donte DiVincenzo said. “Let’s get ready for the playoffs.”

Among the biggest blowouts on Sunday: Oklahoma City’s win over Dallas; Indiana stayed out of the play-in by beating Atlanta by 42; Sacramento downed Portland by 39; San Antonio topped Detroit by 28 and Orlando – who could have been in the play-in with a loss – rolled past Milwaukee by 25.

Orlando won 47 games to capture the Southeast Division and get back to the playoffs for the first time since 2020.

“So proud of them,” Magic coach Jamahl Mosley said. “There’s not really a lot of words for it. You talk about a group who has been up, been down, battled back, resilient ... they proved it. Big stakes, they took it in their own hands.”

The Heat-76ers winner will face No 2 seed New York in the first-round of the playoffs, and the loser will play host to the Hawks-Bulls winner on Friday night for the chance to meet No 1 overall seed Boston. The Lakers-Pelicans winner gets the No 7 seed and will play defending champion Denver in round one – the Lakers were swept by the Nuggets last season – and the Lakers-Pelicans loser will face the Sacramento-Golden State winner for the right to play No 1 Oklahoma City.

Golden State won a Game 7 at Sacramento last season to advance. The Warriors will have to win a play-in game there Tuesday that’ll have Game 7-type consequences.

“It’ll be a great atmosphere,” Warriors coach Steve Kerr said. “We were there last year, obviously. They’ll have their crowd behind them. It’s nice to not get on a plane. So, we’ll take the bus up there tomorrow, have a day to prepare and be ready to go.”