Locker Room Access: How to survive a back-to-back in the NBA
The grind of the NBA season has been top of mind for teams, league executives, and sleep doctors in recent years, with the Association continuing to tinker with the schedule in order to reduce back-to-backs and the general wear and tear that a truncated calendar wreaks on players' bodies.
The resurgent Wizards won't have much to complain about after their recently completed back-to-back saw them stun the Warriors in D.C. on Tuesday before dismantling the Raptors in Toronto on Wednesday, but that doesn't mean they weren't feeling the effects of two games in two cities over two nights.
As they basked in the glow of their successful trip north, the Wizards discussed how they deal with the dreaded back-to-back that ends on the road.
Marcin Gortat: Oh man, it's obviously a different game - a different approach. You're sore from the day before and definitely tired from the day before. You don't have a shootaround in the morning where you can do things with the ball or with weights. You've got to get yourself ready in the hotel.
How do you get ready for an NBA game in a hotel?
Gortat: Everybody's doing different things. Veterans and rookies do different things. Basically, you've got to get your body right. Get a massage, get a cold tub, get in the pool, whatever to get yourself ready to play.
Markieff Morris: The day of, for me, I just get a lot of rest. I've got a NormaTec, so I use it. I ice my legs, get my legs ready for the game, get a nice nap in right before the game, wake up, have a cold shower, and get ready for the game.
Bradley Beal: My routine never changes. I continue to do the same things, show up at the same time, and go through my regiment. It's all mental. Once you step on that floor, you're tired, your body's going to tell you you're tired, but your mind controls it all. Your mind tells your body what to do, so you've got to give it your all, and be confident in it.
The mind is where the battle is won or lost
(Photo courtesy Action Images)
Gortat: It's mind over matter. It's not X's and O's. It's just about your brain, getting yourself ready to play, and putting yourself in position to be successful.
Morris: Traveling in the middle is tough. It's the body. If you let your mind control the body, you'll be alright. Sometimes you really don't have it, and you've just got to will it. (Back-to-backs) are all about will at the end of the day.
Is sleep what suffers the most when you play a back-to-back in two cities?
Beal: Yeah, I think so. You try to get as much as possible - try to nap, try to find some ways to get some type of rest, but your sleep is always unstable. This is the NBA. We travel and get in at 2, 3 in the morning, so everything's going to be a bit off, especially when you're in different time zones. It's difficult, but at the end of day, everybody's gotta do it. Everyone's body is tired at this point in the year. We're playing against grown men everyday. It's a long year. It's just a matter of being mentally tough, taking care of your body, eating the right foods.
Gortat: We had a little break at (Canadian) customs, so we came very late. 3 o'clock to the hotel, many of us went to sleep at maybe 4 o'clock in the morning. Then you wake up for a meeting, go back to the hotel after the meeting and sleep again.
Morris: For me, it's horrible. It messes my sleep patterns up. You think about it, I get myself up, up, up, up, up for a three-hour game, and then it's hard to shut down at the end of the night. For instance, yesterday (Tuesday night), they kept me in customs til 4:30 in the morning. Get out, I got a (team) meeting at 11 (a.m.). But this is my job, so I've got to find a way to do it.
It's tough. You forget - like literally - you forget where you are. You forget room numbers. You get room numbers every other day, so I get caught going to my last room number from my last hotel. That happens all the time. That's why rookies hit that rookie wall. Eighty-two games is a lot. I tell my rookies all the time, 'You can play well one or two games, but what are you gonna do the next 80 games?' You've got to prepare yourself in the summer for this brutal season.
Scott Brooks: I knew that (the players) would (have energy). I was worried about myself. I was tired...I was tired. Not a lot of sleep, but you've gotta do your job.
It's safe to say Brooks' Wizards did theirs, but the journey only gets tougher from here. Fifteen of Washington's final 23 games are on the road, as the Wizards close their season on a chaotic six-week trek that includes two separate five-game road trips and five more back-to-backs - all of which involve travel in the middle.
Better fire up those NormaTecs.