The Knicks were one of four road teams to win Game 1 of the Conference Semis, rallying from 20 down to stun the Celtics 108-105.
Road teams are having an uncommonly strong run in the playoffs this year. It seems the concept of “home-court advantage” is dwindling or at least being put under the microscope thus far. Away teams have been wreaking havoc in the second round of the postseason in particular.
Perhaps the strongest example of that newfound reality is that, for the first time since the NBA expanded to a 16-team playoff format in 1984-85, all four road teams won Game 1 of the conference semifinals. Denver edged Oklahoma City 121-119 on Aaron Gordon’s last-second 3, New York erased a 20-point deficit to beat Boston 108-105 and Golden State controlled Minnesota in a 99-88 win. Each game offered a different storyline, but together they made postseason history.
The dominance of the road teams doesn’t stop there. Road teams won the first six games of the conference semifinals until the streak ended when the Thunder evened the series against the Nuggets with a 149-106 win in Game 2 at Paycom Center. Furthermore, road teams are currently 10-4 before Monday’s doubleheader in the second round alone and 28-29 since the beginning of the postseason. If that sounds like a lot — well, it is.
Counting only the first and second rounds, the 28 road wins so far in the 2025 NBA Playoffs have eclipsed the totals of the previous three seasons: 27 in 2024, 24 in 2023 and 26 in 2022. This year’s semifinals round is still ongoing, which means that there is plenty of runway for road teams to bank more wins and further eclipse those recent road win totals.
The way the conference semifinals are shaping up opens the possibility of lower-seeded teams advancing. The only series in which the team with the higher seed is currently going through the conference finals is the one in which the Timberwolves are up 2-1 against the Warriors, but that’s a battle between the sixth and seventh seeds in the West.
The upcoming week will paint a clearer picture ahead of the conference finals, of course. But the way that teams have played on the road means that the rest of the conference semis themselves will be completely unpredictable. Fans can sit back and enjoy the chaos as the concept of home-court advantage continues to get subverted, seemingly on a nightly basis.
