NBA plans to officially resume its playing activities with several exhibition games, which should help teams settle into competitive form before the regular season kicks in. However, these games will be a bit shorter than usual.
According to NBA.com, the league decided to shorten the first set of exhibition games by eight minutes. This means that each quarter will be 10-minutes long instead of the usual 12 minutes.
The decision was made in order to ease the load on players who haven’t competed in four months, and also to help the teams that still don’t have their full rosters in Orlando. It is expected that the remaining two sets of exhibition games resume with the standard timing.
“I believe that it’s done just trying to get safety first for the players,” said Orlando coach Steve Clifford of the decision. “I think most teams are like us, where everybody is just feeling their way and guys aren’t in the type of condition they would normally be in a training camp situation.”
Each team will play three exhibition games before the NBA resumes its 2019/20 regular season. The first games will be played on Wednesday and are scheduled to continue through the end of July.
