Points Differential - NBA Finals through 4 games

An ESPN report on the finals noted the margin of victory through four games and placed it in historical perspective by noting that there have only been a few instances where the margin has been less or the same. 

One example given was the '69 finals between Boston and LA.  Like this year's series, the total differential is equal to 15 points.  But of course margin of victory is aligned with total points.   So looking at that '69 series one notes that while the margins match this finals the points don't.  Average combined points through 4 games of that series equaled 215.25 compared to this year's 176.75.  That is 22% higher.  So the '69 series, at least by the standard of points differential, was actually much closer than this year's finals through 4 games.

Not your father's NBA

I caught a bit of the PTI interview with Mark Jackson, the new head coach of the Warriors.  Jackson emphasized that the game "starts at the defensive end of the court."  That is indeed today's NBA.  How different that is from the NBA I knew, when it was clearly offensive oriented. 

This morning I took a look at the 1985 finals between the Lakers (Magic, Kareem, Worthy) and the Celtics (Bird, McHale, Parrish). In that series no team scored less than 100 points (Boston was low with exactly 100 in game 6) and the highest score was 148.  Average combined score for the series was 229, with the median equal to 221.5.

In the current series, no team has reached 100 points.  The combined average score is 176.75, or a 22.8% drop from the '85 series.  The median combined score is 175 which equates to a 22.0% decline.