The 2026 NBA playoffs will feature legendary matchups, intriguing questions and all kinds of X-factors. But who has the most at stake this postseason, and who will ultimately win it all? Our writers weigh in.What's your take on the East?

Tom Haberstroh: Boston’s magical run will continue to the Finals. In training camp, if Boston envisioned a best-case scenario for the regular season, the actual 2025-26 season would be it. It’s one thing for Jayson Tatum to come back healthy.

It’s another thing for him to look like the Jayson Tatum of old. And he has. Bad news for the East.Ben Rohrbach: The Celtics are the only team in the East capable of contending with the West.

The Pistons lack a secondary creator. The Knicks have defensive holes. The Cavaliers rely on James Harden to get them over the hump in the second round.

Not to say any of them cannot beat the Celtics. I just think none of them have a shot in the Finals. Only Boston, with a healthy Tatum, can challenge the depth of whoever emerges from a gauntlet in the other conference.Everything to know for the NBA playoffs: Predictions, series previews, X-factorsKelly Iko: I’m not saying there’ll be an upset, but I’m not saying there won’t be one.

Over the final two months of the regular season, the Spurs and Thunder are first and second in net rating. The next two on the list? Hawks and Hornets.

I say this with the assumption that red-hot Charlotte gets past Orlando (this may be a jinx), but even with how the Hornets and Hawks are set up — opposite ends of the pace spectrum — the mandates are clear: spread the floor, move the ball and have different pressure points of attack. Both look like very, very tough outs. Dan Devine: I think all of the favorites will make it out of Round 1, but all of them will have to sweat to do it.

The Pistons have been the most buttoned-up team in the East all season, and might wind up staring down a perpetual chaos machine out of Charlotte. The Celtics look like a war machine, but there’s nothing fun about having to try to corral Tyrese Maxey for 48 minutes (or more, if Nick Nurse can bend space-time to play him even longer than that). Knicks-Hawks and Cavs-Raptors are both pace-of-play style clashes, and the favorites are going to have to work to maintain control of the wheel.

Nothing in the East feels like an obvious walkover, which makes everything more compelling. Styles make fights. Weaknesses force innovation.

Perfection is boring; let’s embrace being fractured and have fun getting weird.Nekias Duncan: There’s a heightened level of the “unknown.” Take Cavs-Raptors; their regular-season matchups happened before Thanksgiving. We are getting a fresh look at these two in a high-stakes setting. We only got one “real” look at Hawks-Knicks back on April 6, and even that lacked positional cross-matching from the Hawks’ side — they didn’t stash a wing on Karl-Anthony Towns with their center (Onyeka Okongwu) roaming off of Josh Hart, a popular gambit — that I’m sure we’ll see this time around.

Health permitting, you can build a reasonable case to any of these teams winning multiple playoff rounds; that feels rare.What's your take on the West?Rohrbach: The Spurs are every bit as good as the Thunder, and the Nuggets are as good as both of them. Every metric imaginable suggests that San Antonio, with Victor Wembanyama, is on par with OKC, the defending NBA champions. Denver would have exceeded 60 wins, too, if it had been healthy all season.

With apologies to the Timberwolves, who could beat the Nuggets in the first round, one of three teams is winning the West — and all might have an equal chance.Iko: Outside of another Nuggets-Wolves rerun, this might be the most ho-hum first round seen in quite some time. I don’t expect either Oklahoma City or San Antonio to bat an eye at the Warriors/Suns or Blazers, and outside of a few Kevin Durant/LeBron James moments, I’m not losing sleep over Rockets-Lakers. Seems like everyone is just waiting on the Spurs and Thunder to meet once again.

Duncan: I love the tests the top three teams will get to start their postseason run. Most would agree the Thunder, Spurs, and Nuggets — in whichever order — are the likeliest teams to represent the West in the Finals this year, but they also have to face some demons before we get there. The Thunder will either see the Stephen Curry-Draymond Green combo, or a Suns team with an annoying defense that’s had them in a headlock in different points of their regular-season matchups.

The Spurs have to face a Blazers group with defensive personnel that can tap into all sorts of pressure and cross-matching looks. The Nuggets have to face the Timberwolves. Again.

Bring me all of it.Devine: I think the Thunder are going to waltz to the conference finals, and I think that whoever they face coming out of the other side of the bracket will have had to basically go through “The Raid” to greet them there. That doesn’t mean they can’t get got, but they were already the favorites fo