Lakers is a better team now but reaching the finals, that is a lot of effort to do and luck as well, it means they have to beat the warriors.
Once they are in the finals, it seems like it's a guaranteed win for them because they have already beat the best team in the NBA which is in the west.
I wouldn't be so sure about that. The Celtis are the second best team in the NBA right now, and they accomplished a lot of stuff while Uncle Drew and Hayward were injured. They have a pretty nice chance to win the Conference, they just have to beat the Raptors, 76ers still need more experience and Embiid needs to get more playing time, until then, this conference looks looked for a Raptors vs Celtics Conference Finals, which the Celtics should win. I really hope for a Celtics vs Warriors series, its going to be fun watching Kyrie vs Steph one more time. Celtics have an incredible defense and amazing home court advantage, cant wait to see them play.
Celtics as the second best team in the league ? That is a big stretch, celtics is certainly second best team in east but if you think they are better than rockets or even lakers that is not realistic. They may not be even better than raptors at this point, hayward is coming back but he is a wing player and they had great wings last year with brown and tatum already, hayward is overlapping there, the only player they missed out on is kyrie and with him they are not jumping to second best team all of a sudden.
We still have lakers and rockets on west and even pelicans who thanks to AD outmatches most of these teams and even got a game from warriors because he is the best big in the league and all these teams don't have proper big. So, I say celtics is more like 5th best team, after warriors, rockets, lakers, pelicans, probably even okc and raptors.