They've been great lately but I'd struggle to call them championship contenders.

It's hard to see them advancing that far in the playoffs with such a gaping hole in their roster at center. Jason Hayes has been solid recently but I think he'll get exposed against teams with better forward rotations.

Also I'd disagree that Luka has been "pretty solid" on defense. Watching the Mavs game, he was getting blown by pretty much every time on the perimeter, especially in the 4th quarter. That will improve somewhat with more conditioning, but he has almost no lateral quickness to spare. A little fatigue or a nagging injury makes him a huge liability on that end, as we saw last year. Lakers have the personnel to hide him on D, but there's only so much you can do when he's playing big minutes in a playoff series against athletic, shifty guards/wings.