Way-too-early NBA Finals prediction

Ben: Knicks (Winner) vs Mavericks

With the Knicks exit in the conference semi-finals, New York has added on to that dangerous offense with the additions of Mikal Bridges and Karl-Anthony Towns, two proven players who have made a name for themselves in different ways in the league.

Bridges is a career 48 percent three-point shooter and Towns doing the best of both worlds bullying people inside. Jalen Brunson has helped the Knicks with their plans to get out of the East.

The Mavericks kept a lot of their pieces while also adding Klay Thompson one of the best shooters in history and are in a great position to come out of the west again.

In a clash of up-and-coming stars in the NBA between Brunson and Doncic it feels like the Knicks are gonna have a slight edge, but both players if the season plays out this way will have a compelling case to be the next face of the NBA.

Julia: Celtics vs Thunder (Winner)

The reigning NBA Champions, the Boston Celtics bring back almost their entire roster, only losing Svi Mykhailiuk. They extended key stars Jayson Tatum, Derrick White and Sam Houser over the summer and entered the offseason with an April extension of Jrue Holiday’s contract.

Their biggest concern is at the center position with 38-year-old Al Horford and an out till December, Kristaps Porziņġis.

The Celtics look to dominate the Eastern Conference again and will win the conference title, but I don’t think they’ll have enough gas in the tank to repeat as 2025 Champions.

The Oklahoma City Thunder are tied with the Portland Trailblazers for the youngest average roster age in the league at 26.4 years old. Reigning Coach of the Year Mark Daigneault leads the team coming off of a 57-win season.

Last season, they joined the Celtics as the only team to be ranked in the top five in the league offensively and defensively.

The West is anyone’s conference this season and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander will lead the Thunder to their first finals appearance since the 2012 superteam roster. The Thunder will take the 2025 Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy out west and beat the Celtics in a six-game series.

Bronwyn: Celtics (Winners) vs Mavericks

No NBA team has repeated as champion since Golden State did it in 2017, but this is the year for the Celtics to make it happen with a repeat of last year's championship when they defeated the Dallas Mavericks in a best-of-four, dominating the Mavs 4-1.

The Mavericks will have a chance for a back-to-back run if they can build up their physicality along with their shooting depth. Mavs player Josh Green had a stellar Game 5 with 14 points in less than 23 minutes, hitting 4-of-6 3-pointers and 5-of-8 overall. But he only averaged 6.6 shots this season, tied for sixth on the squad not even topping the top five.

However, even if they are able to complete this they will be faced once again with a depth-filled Celtics team. The team is high-scoring, and a large portion can be credited to their deep ball range. Boston made 1,351 threes last season, which sits as the second-most in NBA history. Only the 2022-23 Golden State Warriors made more threes with 1,363.

The Celtics will manage to defeat the Mavericks 4-2 this year just slightly different this past season's outcome.

Andrew: Knicks vs Thunder (Winner)

The full embracement of the “Nova Knicks,” despite Donte DiVincenzo getting traded, provides hard-fought minutes for a team and a coach who loves to get a lot of minutes out of his top players.

Other Villanova alums like Josh Hart, and newly acquired Knick, Mikal Bridges proved last year that they can be a consistently great player when they play a majority of the game. With superstar Jalen Brunson, these Knicks can make it far with high-level play on both sides of the ball.

The team runs out of gas by the NBA Finals because of its short bench. The addition of all-star center Karl-Anthony Towns is not enough to be the last team standing in the NBA gauntlet.

On the western side, one of the youngest teams on the rise takes the jump and makes it back to the finals for the first time since 2012.

The Thunder’s addition of Isaiah Hartenstein makes a massive difference and adds a huge presence on both ends of the floor, in the paint. This allows Chet Holmgren to spread the floor and gives Shai Gilgeous-Alexander more options to dish the ball.

Hartenstein will get the last laugh over his former team as the Thunder will defeat the Knicks in six games.

Alex: Celtics (winner) vs Nuggets

Other teams in the Eastern Conference have made moves. The Knicks, most notably, made two blockbuster offseason trades for Mikal Bridges and Karl-Anthony Towns. The 76ers added Paul George to pair with Joel Embiid, and the Giannis-Dame duo should improve after a full offseason under Doc Rivers.

However, this will not be enough to dethrone the Celtics. They retained their top nine rotation players, including Finals MVP Jaylen Brown and superstar Jayson Tatum.

Continuity is an underrated element in building a dynasty, and the Celtics’ ability to extend Tatum, Jrue Holiday, Derrick White and Sam Hauser means the team should only improve the more they practice with each other.

The Celtics were dominant in their championship run, only losing three games en route to a title, and barring injury or chaos, appear to be the clear-cut favorites to emerge from the Eastern Conference.

The competition is much tougher out West, with the reigning conference champion Dallas Mavericks, Minnesota Timberwolves, Denver Nuggets and Oklahoma City Thunder all having viable arguments as the Western Conference favorite.

Others, such as the Golden State Warriors and Phoenix Suns, have the star power to disrupt the presumed hierarchy.

All that being said, the Nuggets have the best player in the league in 3x MVP Nikola Jokic. His pick-and-roll with Jamal Murray is among the most unguardable plays in the league, and Michael Porter Jr. and Aaron Gordon are reliable tertiary scoring options.

The Nuggets recently won a championship with that aforementioned core. With the rest of the league seemingly catching a case of big-move-itis, the two teams who have retained the majority of their core will meet in the finals.

Much like the last finals, Boston’s star power and strong depth will be too much for Jokic and the Nuggets to overcome. The Celtics will win their 19th banner and become the first team to defend their championship since the KD-Warriors of 2017-18.

Ben Hoyt is a third-year majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact him, email benhoytbroadcasting@gmail.com.

Andrew Deal is a second-year majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact him, email asd5765@psu.edu

Bronwyn Liber is a second-year majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact her, email brl5354@psu.edu.

Alex Perez is a third-year majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact him, please email app5877@psu.edu.