Then rookie D.J. Kennedy sparked Erie to the D-League playoffs last season./Erie Times-News

The D-League is the testing board for the NBA.

Whether it’s bringing in the international goaltending rule, a 3-minute overtime or having top four seeds pick their first-round playoff opponents, the D-League has always experimented.

However, D-League has gone traditional for its upcoming draft next month – sort of.

Instead of having a lottery to determine a draft order, the league is basing it on last year’s records, meaning the playoff teams will pick after the teams that didn’t make the playoffs.

Eight of the 16 teams make the playoffs.

Now the NBA has a draft lottery, but it’s for the teams that don’t make the playoffs. What the D-League did in the past was have a lottery for every team regardless.

I understood the theory of it, though.

Since the rosters can drastically change from year to year, it gave everyone a fair shot to get the top picks in the draft.

On the other hand, it’s more logical to let  the worst team from a season ago pick first.

That’s how the NFL does it.

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LeBron James scored 37 points in leading the Cavaliers past the Lakers on Thursday night.

After scoring 12 consecutive points in the fourth quarter of Cleveland’s 93-87 win against the Los Angeles Lakers, James sat in his locker with his feet in ice and his knee wrapped in nice.

Still trying to figure out what he’s doing with his hair these days, but when you score 37 points, dish out  nine assists and grab five rebounds against the defending NBA champions, you can wear your hair anyway you like.

Here’s what James had to say after the game.

You talk about (closing games) all the time. You really commanded it in that last couple of minutes?
“Uh, that’s what it’s about. I know you guys are like what we waiting on and why we wait until the fourth quarter so much, but we know that’s money time. That’s when most of the games are won 85 percent of the time games are won in the fourth quarter. In our case, probably 95 percent of the time so it was a big game for us. We played well and we’ve just go to keep the momentum going.”

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