The 5 most memorable NBA playoff upsets of the last 20 years

The first week of the playoffs have already been a thrilling, emotionally draining experience, and it's the unpredictability of it all that has fans buzzing.

In the East, the 38-44, eighth-seeded Hawks are up a game on the 56-26, top-seeded Pacers and the Wizards stole both games in Chicago to take a 2-0 series lead into their first home playoff games in six years.

Given the level of competition and parity in the West, the upsets may not seem as drastic, but the eighth-seeded Mavericks got a split in San Antonio against the league-best Spurs, the seventh-seeded Grizzlies are up 2-1 on the No. 2 Thunder and the Trail Blazers are up 2-0 on the Rockets without even having played a game in Portland yet.

In fact, the lower seeds are 11-8 through 19 games of the playoffs so far, with nine of those 11 wins coming on the road.

So on that note, with everyone talking potential upsets, let's relive the five most memorable postseason shockers of the last 20 years...

1994 - No. 8 Nuggets defeat No. 1 SuperSonics 3-2
Any list of NBA playoff upsets begins and ends with the 1993-94 Nuggets becoming the first No. 8 seed to knock off a No. 1, with the tortured Sonics and their fans the first top-seeded victim. Seattle finished the regular season 63-19, five games clear of the league's next best team, had two All-Stars in Shawn Kemp and Gary Payton and took a 2-0 lead in the best-of-five series over the 42-40 Nuggets with a couple of wins by a combined 34 points.

In other words, this shouldn't have been a series.

Then the Nuggets responded with a 110-93 Game 3 victory in Denver before taking Games 4 and 5 in overtime to shock the basketball world. There are few images in NBA history as iconic as Dikembe Mutombo clutching the game ball while lying on his back on the KeyArena floor in the aftermath of the upset.

1999 - No. 8 Knicks defeat No. 1 Heat 3-2
The Knicks made two major splashes before the start of the lockout-shortened 1998-99 season in acquiring Marcus Camby and Latrell Sprewell, but injuries derailed their regular season plans and the team had to rally down the stretch just to squeak into the playoffs as a 27-23 No. 8 seed. The No. 1 Heat were only six games better at 33-17 thanks to the short season, but they still entered the series knowing that a No. 8 had only beaten a No. 1 once.

The teams split the first four games of the best-of-five series in alternating blowouts, with all four decided by 10-24 points. Game 5, however, came down to the wire in Miami, where Allan Houston's runner in the lane with 0.8 seconds remaining proved the difference:

The Knicks went on to become the first and only No. 8 seed to advance to The Finals, where without Patrick Ewing, they fell to the Spurs.

2004 - No. 3 Pistons defeat No. 2 Lakers 4-1
These teams were only separated by two games in the standings and the Pistons were a deep team that featured a starting lineup of Chauncey Billups, Richard Hamilton, Tayshaun Prince, Rasheed Wallace and Ben Wallace, but NBA history had taught us that sum-of-its-parts teams with only one All-Star (Ben Wallace) aren't supposed to beat legendary, star-studded teams like the 2003-04 Lakers in the playoffs, let alone The Finals.

For that reason and the fact that they not only beat them, but beat them handily (They were +45 over the five games), the 2003-04 Pistons finding a way to take down the Shaq, Kobe, Malone, Payton led Lakers en route to one of the unlikeliest championships in league history has to be considered among memorable upsets.

2007 - No. 8 Warriors defeat No. 1 Mavericks 4-2
What the 1994 Nuggets were to one generation, the 2007 Warriors were to another, becoming the first No. 8 seed to beat a No. 1 in a best-of-seven series.

While Golden State went a mediocre 42-40 to squeak into the postseason for the first time in 13 years (the second-longest playoff drought in NBA history), Dallas won 67 games during the 2006-07 season, becoming one of 10 NBA teams ever to amass a winning percentage of at least .817 in a season. Up to that point, seven of the previous nine teams to do so had gone on to win the championship, with the other two at least making the Conference Finals. In addition, the Mavericks had finished six games ahead of anyone else in the standings and 25 games ahead of the Warriors.

But behind the electric play of Baron Davis, the smooth stroke of Stephen Jackson, solid contributions from Jason Richardson and Most Improved Player Monta Ellis, and an unforgettable crowd at Oracle Arena - where the Dubs won all three home games in the series - the Warriors pulled off the stunning upset.

Is there anything more fitting than a 2006-07 Warriors montage to the tune of the greatest underdog music of all time?

2011 - No. 8 Grizzlies defeat No. 1 Spurs 4-2
The four-time champion Spurs won 61 games to finish atop the Western Conference standings, while the 46-36 Grizzlies were without Rudy Gay (this was a big deal at the time, really), had just the 12th-best record of the 16 playoff teams, were in the playoffs for the first time in five years and had not a single playoff victory to their franchise's credit, entering the series against mighty San Antonio 0-12 in postseason play.

But Memphis stunned the Spurs in a thrilling Game 1 behind 25 points and 14 rebounds from Zach Randolph that set the stage for the rest of the shocking series, and despite blowing a Game 5 lead and chance to win the series on a Gary Neal buzzer beater, the Grizz responded with 31 more from Randolph in a series clinching Game 6, as the Randolph/Gasol/Conley, 'Grit and Grind' era of Grizzlies basketball was born.