Early-season NBA records can be misleading. Hot starts fade, slow starts stabilize, and a few teams quietly establish themselves as real threats long before the standings catch up. To measure which teams are truly playing the best basketball right now, RotoWire developed the NBA Momentum Index — a composite power indicator that evaluates how well teams are performing on both ends, not just whether they're winning games.
The Index scores every team on five key performance indicators over a rolling two-week window: Net Rating, Offensive Rating, Defensive Rating, Effective Field Goal Percentage and Win Percentage. These metrics are normalized, weighted, and combined into a single number — the Pulse Score — which reflects current form and sustainability.
This will be updated every two weeks all season. Each update will highlight:
Risers: Teams gaining meaningful momentum
Fallers: Teams losing rhythm or efficiency
Stability Teams: Clubs holding strong with consistent play
This helps track performance arcs, not just standings shifts.
What's New This Week (Week 7 Update)
This window (Nov. 19 – Dec. 2) brought some of the largest movement swings so far:
Huge Risers
Orlando Magic (+10) – leap into the No. 2 spot behind elite offense
Miami Heat (+12) – massive defensive turnaround
Memphis Grizzlies (+20) – biggest jump of the cycle
Indiana Pacers (+15) – massive climb despite middling record
Brooklyn Nets (+1 but out of the basement with real improvements)
Major Fallers
Phoenix Suns (–14) – biggest drop; defensive collapse
Detroit Pistons (–6) – offense cooled sharply
Denver Nuggets (–6) – defense regressing
Celtics (–3); 
Warriors (–4); 
Bucks (–4)
Stability Teams
Oklahoma City Thunder – remain No. 1 again
San Antonio Spurs – negligible movement
Toronto Raptors – still strong, only slight dip
This window clearly shows shifts in efficiency and form that standings alone don't reveal.
Methodology:
The NBA Momentum Index uses publicly available advanced stats from the current season, calculated across the most recent two-week game window for all 30 teams.
For each team, we collected:
Net Rating (NetRtg)
Offensive Rating (ORtg)
Defensive Rating (DRtg)
Effective Field Goal Percentage (eFG%)
Win Percentage over the same window
Each stat was then:
Normalized to a 0–100 scale.
Weighted based on predictive strength and sustainability:
| Metric | Weight | Purpose |
| Net Rating | 30% | Best overall indicator of true team strength |
| Offensive Rating | 20% | Measures scoring efficiency + shot creation |
| Defensive Rating | 20% | Captures ability to prevent opponent runs |
| Effective FG% | 20% | Rewards teams generating good shots |
| Win % (this window only) | 10% | Adds contextual performance temperature |
These weighted values were averaged into a final Pulse Score, which determines ranking.
The Index will be recalculated every two weeks, comparing new Pulse Scores vs. previous values to track:
Momentum shifts
Breakout teams
Cooling trends
Underlying performance vs. record
| Rank | Team | Win% | NetRtg | ORtg | DRtg | eFG% | Pulse Score | Previous Rank | Rank Change |
| 1 | Oklahoma City Thunder | 1.000 | 14.3 | 119.6 | 105.3 | 59.9 | 95.3 | 1 | 0 |
| 2 | Orlando Magic | 0.833 | 13.3 | 124.7 | 111.4 | 55.8 | 80.9 | 12 | 10 |
| 3 | Miami Heat | 0.857 | 11.1 | 117.2 | 106.1 | 54.1 | 77.9 | 15 | 12 |
| 4 | Los Angeles Lakers | 0.800 | 5.1 | 124.1 | 119 | 60.2 | 67.3 | 14 | 10 |
| 5 | New York Knicks | 0.714 | 6.9 | 122 | 115.1 | 57.7 | 65.7 | 9 | 4 |
| 6 | Houston Rockets | 0.667 | 9.6 | 119 | 109.4 | 51.8 | 64.4 | 5 | -1 |
| 7 | Memphis Grizzlies | 0.714 | 6.2 | 118.7 | 112.5 | 55.4 | 63 | 27 | 20 |
| 8 | Toronto Raptors | 0.750 | 4.4 | 114 | 109.6 | 54.1 | 60.9 | 7 | -1 |
| 9 | Detroit Pistons | 0.667 | 2.8 | 115.8 | 113 | 55.9 | 55.5 | 3 | -6 |
| 10 | Denver Nuggets | 0.571 | 3.6 | 126.6 | 122.9 | 60.9 | 55.1 | 4 | -6 |
| 11 | Boston Celtics | 0.667 | 1.8 | 125 | 123.2 | 58.9 | 53.6 | 8 | -3 |
| 12 | Minnesota Timberwolves | 0.571 | 2.8 | 118.2 | 115.4 | 55.9 | 50.9 | 6 | -6 |
| 13 | San Antonio Spurs | 0.667 | 1.3 | 122.1 | 120.8 | 54.5 | 49 | 13 | 0 |
| 14 | Atlanta Hawks | 0.571 | 0.7 | 113.9 | 113.2 | 56.7 | 48.7 | 11 | -3 |
| 15 | Indiana Pacers | 0.429 | 2.4 | 112.6 | 110.2 | 55.2 | 45.4 | 30 | 15 |
| 16 | Phoenix Suns | 0.571 | -1.4 | 113.1 | 114.5 | 54.8 | 42.8 | 2 | -14 |
| 17 | Cleveland Cavaliers | 0.429 | 1.2 | 116.2 | 115 | 55.5 | 42.1 | 10 | -7 |
| 18 | Dallas Mavericks | 0.429 | -0.7 | 112.4 | 113.1 | 52.7 | 36.6 | 19 | 1 |
| 19 | Philadelphia 76ers | 0.429 | -3.7 | 110.3 | 114 | 52.4 | 30.8 | 17 | -2 |
| 20 | Golden State Warriors | 0.333 | -1.5 | 111.3 | 112.8 | 51.9 | 30.7 | 16 | -4 |
| 21 | Brooklyn Nets | 0.333 | -4.4 | 111.5 | 115.9 | 53.1 | 25.9 | 22 | 1 |
| 22 | Milwaukee Bucks | 0.143 | -4.4 | 113.1 | 117.5 | 58.9 | 23.5 | 18 | -4 |
| 23 | Portland Trail Blazers | 0.286 | -5.7 | 110.3 | 115.9 | 50.9 | 19.5 | 20 | -3 |
| 24 | Chicago Bulls | 0.286 | -8.8 | 109.5 | 118.3 | 54.5 | 16.9 | 23 | -1 |
| 25 | New Orleans Pelicans | 0.125 | -4.7 | 115.4 | 120 | 52.9 | 15.6 | 26 | 1 |
| T-26 | Charlotte Hornets | 0.286 | -7.6 | 113.5 | 121.1 | 50.9 | 14.5 | 25 | -1 |
| T-26 | Utah Jazz | 0.333 | -10.3 | 111.3 | 121.6 | 53.8 | 14.5 | 21 | -5 |
| 28 | Washington Wizards | 0.286 | -10.2 | 110.1 | 120.3 | 54.1 | 13.5 | 29 | 1 |
| 29 | Sacramento Kings | 0.286 | -10.1 | 107.7 | 117.8 | 51.4 | 11.7 | 28 | -1 |
| 30 | Los Angeles Clippers | 0.143 | -9.8 | 113.2 | 123 | 52.9 | 6.4 | 24 | -6 |
*All metric stats are courtesy of Basketball-Reference.com
Who Are The NBA's Hottest Teams?
Anytime you start a season with 21 wins in 22 games, chances are you're going to grab the top spot in your league.
That's exactly what's happened with the defending champs from the Sooner State, as the Oklahoma City Thunder hold onto the NBA's best pulse score, at 95.3.
Overall, Mark Daigneault's bunch rank well ahead of the next closest club by pulse score, with the Orlando Magic holding that honor with a total of 80.9 points this year.
Throw in the third-place Miami Heat (77.9 pulse score), Los Angeles Lakers (67.3 pulse score) and the New York Knicks (65.7 pulse score) and you have the upper end of the NBA's best teams by pulse score covered.
What To Know About NBA's Hottest Teams
The Thunder's hot start has been paced by holding the league's best defense, metrics wise, with a defensive rating of 105.2, with OKC giving up a league-best 107.0 points per game in 2025.
Throw in the NBA's fifth ranked offense (120.2) and third-ranked scoring offense (122.3 points per game) and you have a decent idea why the Thunder are well ahead of their peers in the NBA as the league approaches its customary quarter point.
More surprising is Orlando's place in the league table, momentum wise, given the team's current fifth place standing in the East, with a 13-8 (.619) mark to date.
Much of that momentum is due to Orlando's seventh ranked defense, rating wise, at 113.0, while the Magic's offensive rating (118.1) is ninth overall and their net rating of +5.1 is eighth overall.
Miami's inclusion is less of a surprise, as the Heat are third in the East at 14-7, three games back of the first-place Detroit Pistons and a half-game behind the Toronto Raptors.
In the Heat's case, head coach Erik Spoelstra's bunch have the NBA's third-ranked defense, ratings wise, at 111.7, with the fifth ranked net rating, at +5.6.
The 
Lakers (15-5) and Knicks (13-7) follow similar patterns to Orlando and Miami, with L.A. holding the NBA's seventh ranked offensive rating (119.5), while the Knicks are third in the league offensively, with a rating of 121.9 and the fourth best net rating (+6.9) in the 30-team association.
Who's Struggled To Date?
While those five teams are the NBA's best out of the gate, the opposite is true of league cellar dwellers like the Los Angeles Clippers, Sacramento Kings, Washington Wizards, Utah Jazz and the Charlotte Hornets.
Those five teams have gone a combined 26-77 (.252) this season, with the Wizards having the worst record of the lot at 3-17.
When broken down teamwide pulse scores, the Clippers hold the distinction of being the NBA's worst team, momentum wise, as the City of Angels stalwarts have a total of 6.4 points through 21 games.
Luckily for all involved, there's still more than 50 games to go in the NBA's marathon of a regular season, though it's getting late early for some of the league's teams riding the proverbial struggle bus in the opening stretch of the 2025-26 campaign.
