20. Houston Rockets (18): It’s hard to feel the love when you’re dropping games against Minnesota at home, but beating the Nuggets in Denver while Carmelo drops 50 points isn’t an easy the thing to do. At 25-30, it might be too late for the Rockets to sneak into the playoffs, but with 27 games left to play, they could easily nab that eighth seed if they are able to find momentum and run with it.
19. Golden State Warriors (19): Monta Ellis might be the best player not on one of the all-star teams this year – or at least the best scorer of the bunch. He might take one too many shots, but for the month of February, when he scores 24 points or more, the Warriors are 4-0; when he scores less than that, they are 0-2. Although they sit at 24-29 on the season, they gutted out tough wins over Denver and Oklahoma City this week, which shows that they still have a shot at stealing a spot in the playoffs.
18. New York Knicks (16): They couldn’t knock off either LA team this week, but they were able to contain their cross-river rival Nets on Saturday. They are struggling this month (2-4 through six games) and I think that’s because of the mental instability created by the uncertainty of a possible Melo trade.
17. Utah Jazz (12): Jazz fans need all the love they can get right now, as the franchise’s head coach for the past 22 seasons, Jerry Sloan, decided to resign from his post this past week. No one outside of the Jazz’s brass is sure of what actually forced Sloan out, but it’s obvious (especially through a 4-6 record over their last 10) that someone behind-the-scenes was not happy.
16. Phoenix Suns (15): The Suns would have been bumped up higher if not for their week-ending loss to the Kings. Nonetheless, they are continuing to battle for playoff contention as they went 3-1 this past week, and prior to their loss to the Kings, were above .500 for the first time since they were 11-10 on Dec. 7, 2010.
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