The dream final, the best player, what should change?

The opening tournament of the NBA season reaches the knockout rounds, in which one team will lift the NBA Cup and each of its players will win $500,000 in prizes. What started with 30 teams playing four group stage games has now been whittled down to eight quarterfinal contenders.

Four teams from each conference will play for the right to advance to the semifinals on December 7 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, followed by the championship game on December 9. On Monday, the Indiana Pacers will host the Boston Celtics, while the New Orleans Pelicans will travel to the Sacramento Kings.

On Tuesday, the New York Knicks will visit the Milwaukee Bucks, followed by LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers who will host the Phoenix Suns. The tournament has generated a lot of buzz for its unique format, newly designed courts and a surge in interest among fans for early season games.

Before the quarterfinals, our experts analyze the most important questions: what did they like about the tournament so far, who was the best player, what should be changed and who will finally make history by winning the competition’s first title.

The group stage of the seasonal tournament was…?
Tim MacMahon: Fun. The league office figured out a way to add a little more interest to a series of early regular season games. The colorful fields were a great marketing stunt that clearly identified those matchups as tournament games and got people talking about the NBA during the NFL season. If the league can bring back Tuesday and Friday nights during the fall, it will be a huge win.

Jamal Collier: Taken more seriously than expected, both by fans, media, players and teams. Everyone seemed to have enjoyed it and he added some intrigue to the pre-Christmas Day portion of the show. The point differential tiebreakers may have been a little confusing, but they were 100 percent worth it just to see Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla have to apologize to his Chicago Bulls counterpart Billy Donovan for hitting bad for his team.

Dave McMenamin: A resounding success. The stars accepted. Coaches followed the rules of the competition, even if that meant avoiding the institutionalized practice of not increasing the score at the end of matches. The fields and uniforms gave it a unique look. And there were a lot of really fun games that went all the way to the end.

Kendra Andrews: Exactly what the league wanted it to be. He created some meaningful and exciting basketball in November. Taking into account the point difference and the different courts, it created some very fun basketball for games that would not have had as much importance. The icing on the cake was the last game of the group, the Warriors against the Kings, with an ending as dramatic as one could wish for.

Tim Bontemps: A victory for NBA Commissioner Adam Silver. The event’s longtime advocate finally saw his vision come to fruition, and the result was much more interest in the NBA over the past few weeks than in a typical November.

Which match in the quarterfinals of the season’s tournament generates the most intrigue?
MacMahon: Suns-Lakers certainly has the biggest draw. It’s a special occasion every time LeBron James and Kevin Durant face off, which happened for the first time in five years this season. We’re talking about the all-time leading scorer and a guy who broke into the top 10 last week, and both are still performing at All-NBA levels. With Suns guard Devin Booker and Lakers big man Anthony Davis, this game has some serious star power.

Collier: Knicks-Bucks should be a fun matchup. It almost seemed like these teams were headed for a playoff matchup last season before Milwaukee was upset in the first round, so a tournament elimination game between the two will take its place. Both teams are really starting to pick up after a slow start, with the Bucks winning eight of their last nine and the Knicks winning eight of their last 11.

Andrews: I have my eye on Kings-Pelicans. When the seasonal tournament was first introduced, I thought it would be perfect for younger, up-and-coming teams looking to make a splash. Both teams meet that requirement. Zion Williamson and De’Aaron Fox are two of the NBA’s most intriguing young stars, and both teams are looking to prove they’re the real deal.

Bontemps: Celtics over Kings. Boston should take care of Indiana on Monday and I like the Celtics’ chances once they get to Las Vegas. I can make a case for either team in the West, but I think Sacramento will beat the Pelicans in front of their incredible home crowd on Monday, and the extra day of rest will help the Kings against the winner between the Suns and Lakers.

Andrews: Lakers over Celtics. This matchup would become an instant classic, given the pedigree and history between these two franchises. The Celtics have been one of the best teams in the league, but the Lakers have been the best team of the bunch, and I think they want that bragging rights a little more than Boston does.

MacMahon: Celtics over Suns. This isn’t exactly taking a risk, as Boston has the best record and net rating in the league. The Suns, similarly, have the best overall record and net rating among the West’s qualifiers.

Collier: Celtics over Lakers. The NBA couldn’t have imagined it better. It’s the perfect opening matchup to add legitimacy to the tournament. As the best team in the league so far this season, I would expect the Celtics to keep it up in Las Vegas on their way to victory.

McMenamin: Lakers over Knicks. Los Angeles seems extremely motivated to win the cash prize, and New York is a brave group that could pull off a couple of upsets to reach the finals. Furthermore, for a tournament that Silver has already casually referred to as the ‘David Stern Cup,’ there is no title game that pleases the late commissioner more than a showdown between the league’s two biggest markets.