A Tight Race to the Playoffs

I decided to check on the standings tonight and boy was I surprised at how tight the race to the playoffs is.  The first place team in the Eastern Conference has 86 points while the eighth place team has 78.  That is only an eight point difference and when the average amount of games left is twelve, anything can happen.  We could see a swap at the end of those twelve games with the current first place team being in eighth and the current eighth place team being in first.  This tight race is also prevalent in the Western Conference with the exception of the team from Detroit who is way beyond everyone else.  Besides them though, you have another tight race.  I remember last year I was starting to put money down on the playoffs and it looks like this year I will probably have to wait until the playoffs start since there are really no guaranteed teams as of now.