Students at Marriotts Ridge shared their opinions on who will win the NBA’s Most Valuable Player, Clutchest Player, and Rookie of the Year awards. The Most Valuable Player award goes to the player who performed the best during the regular season, the Clutchest Player award goes to a player with an exceptional performance in key moments, and the Rookie of the Year award goes to the best rookie of the regular season. Students have also discussed possible teams that will win the NBA’s Eastern and Western conferences.
Both the Western and Eastern conferences are stacked with impressive teams, but any team in the NBA can win their conference. The leading team for the Eastern conference as of now is the Boston Celtics with a record of 37-15. The Boston Celtics are an accomplished team who made it to the NBA finals last year. However, they lost to the Golden State Warriors and are back for redemption this year.
Sophomore, Caleb Peak shared his opinion on the matter, “Boston is going to win the East for sure. After what happened last year, they are definitely going to make a comeback.”
In the West, the leading team right now is the Denver Nuggets with a record of 37-17. The Denver Nuggets are a team with excellent collaboration and minimal weaknesses.
“The Denver Nuggets have a strong squad with injured players coming back like Micheal Porter Junior and Jamal Murrary… they also have the most valuable player from last year on their team, Nikola Jokic. That man can ball,” sophomore Lucas Trellis said.
The Most Valuable Player for the last two years has been Nikola Jokic. This year he has been averaging 24.8 points per game, 11.3 rebounds per game and 10.1 assists per game. It is possible that Nikola Jokic will win the Most Valuable Player award again this year for the 3rd time in a row. He is a player that makes his team better, he can pass and shoot all while being a 6 ’11 center. He has brought lots of wins to Denver and is one of the best in the league.
The Clutchest Player award is a new award this year. Junior, Jack Bonner comments on this award and makes his own predictions, “Damian Lillard will win the new [Clutchest Player] award. He makes some crazy jump shots and he is also a player that knows how to close a game out.”
There are many standout rookies in the NBA, but only one person can win Rookie of the Year.
“Paolo Banchero is winning rookie of the year. He is the best out of all of them… Paolo is a person to not mess with on the court,” sophomore Res Whitaker said.
Paolo Banchero is averaging 20.3 points per game, 6 rebounds per game and 3.7 assists per game, which are impressive stats for a new player.
The basketball fans at Marriotts Ridge can’t wait to find out which players will win an award this season and see how the playoffs will shape up.