Zach Kram Apr 14, 2026, 07:00 AM ET Close Zach Kram is a national NBA writer for ESPN.com, specializing in short- and long-term trends across the league's analytics landscape. He previously worked at The Ringer covering the NBA and MLB. You can follow Zach on X via @zachkram . Here is a truism about sports fans: Everyone loves brackets. So why should college basketball get all the fun? With the NBA postseason set to begin this week, let's take a page out of the March Madness playbook and fill out an NBA playoff bracket. First, we'll use ESPN's Basketball Power Index to fill in the four teams projected to advance out of the play-in tournament: East 7 seed: Philadelphia 76ers East 8 seed: Charlotte Hornets West 7 seed: Phoenix Suns West 8 seed: Portland Trail Blazers Then, we'll predict the rest of the playoff outcomes, whittling 16 teams down to one raising the Larry O'Brien Trophy in June. East first round Detroit Pistons (1) vs.…