Here we go, Starting with the NBA on ABC Slate On April 4th, it's Lakers Clippers in a potential Western Conference Finals preview right here in L.

A.

And then on April 10th, it's gonna be Lakers at Nets.

We all want to see that one.

Nets won the first matchup earlier this season, but remember no Anthony Davis or Kevin Durant, so hopefully both teams will be at full strength by then.

Now, over on April 17th, we have Warriors Celtics Steph Curry averaging 30 this season.

Can the Celtics dynamic duo of Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum show him down?

Tune in and find out for that on April 24th, the Lakers visiting the Dallas Mavericks, LeBron versus Luca in a matchup that is sure to have some playoff implications.

So, like in for that one.

And on May 2nd, it's the Nets against the Bucks.

You may recall, back on January 18th, these teams played one of the best games of the season, just nonstop, back and forth buckets, so that should be another good one.

We can take a look at some notable games on the ESPN slate as well.

In the second half March 17th.

We have Clippers Mavs in a playoff rematch April 14th.

We have a net six years matchup.

Teams, of course.

Currently atop the Eastern Conference, April 25th, it's Celtics Hornets.

Could this be a Gordon Hayward revenge game?

We also have rematches of both conferences.

Finals matchup from last season, coming to you in May.

All right, At this time, I'd like to welcome in our senior NBA insider, Adrian Word Janowski.

Good to have you back on the show.

And Whoa, we've never talked about a regular season schedule that goes well into May, but here we are.

There have been a lot of postponements in the first half this season as well, with the Spurs being the most recent team to go through it.

So what is the league's plan for makeup games in the second half?

Well, the Spurs, Rachel and Memphis, they're gonna play 40 games in the second half, their scheduled to play 40 games.

The Washington Wizards, who also lost a number of games of postponements in the first half, they'll play 38 remember they were able to make up a few of them already because they had their trouble earlier than Memphis and San Antonio.

But as we get into that second half, if there are postponements and if other teams get hit, you know you're looking at the possibility the league won't be able to make up all of those games before the playoffs.

They don't want to push back the start of the playoffs or the Finals.

They want to keep it on schedule.

So they're at the mercy in the second half of how Covid hits and how many games they may lose in that window.

And look, they've got that looming deadline of the Olympics, right?

They don't want to go up against the Olympic Games.

They want their players to at least be available for the Olympic Games.

So it is important they try to stay on point from here on out.

And I mentioned the Spurs before.

They're among the teams that have more than half their games scheduled for the second half, so what do you think they are going to do?

Do you think that maybe hey, not every team is gonna play 72 games?

Will we get to that point?

Mhm It's certainly possible, Rachel, and you know, we had that last year when the season stopped.

Some teams have played more than others going into the bubble, you know, and win percentage became the criteria for the postseason.

I I think for Memphis, uh, as they try to integrate a healthy Jurin Jackson here at some point in the second half, back in without real practice days.

All of these teams especially, you know, Memphis, San Antonio.

But really, as you move down, almost no teams are gonna have two days off.

You're gonna have your back to backs.

But you're gonna be playing really every other day and you talk to teams and, you know, certainly the concern about that.

But also how travel will change where, you know, in the past, in a schedule that's built out, uh, in a traditional manner, you might go, we're gonna play in Dallas and then we travel to Oklahoma City and you might move around in an orderly way.

I think what you're seeing in this schedule, their teams bouncing around more geographically and you don't get an extra day off going west to east as you might.

And so the toll that's gonna take certainly on players.

Uh, it's taken a great toll already mentally.

All of the things in place, um, with covid and the restrictions.

And I think there's a lot of concern about overtaxing players as they continue just to grind through games.

Uh, mental impact.

This is having and what it's gonna do to the quality of play.

And I think those are all concerns as the NBA tries to get in as many games as they can hear before the postseason.

Yeah, and look, I want to sneak in a question to you about All Star, but I will say this.

I really love this second half of the schedule release.

I know it was made, you know, we had to be this way because of coronavirus, but I think it's given the league.

When you look over the schedule, it's given them the opportunity to juice some matchups.

You get any sense, watch that this could be something that we do from now on, even in non covid times.

It's a good question.

I I haven't heard that as a scenario that I follow.

I do think one thing that we've seen because of covid that I do think you may see in future schedules are the two game home stands or two game road trips in a city.

It's one thing when you come to New York or L A.

And there's two teams and you can stay there and play, stay in town for a few days because you can play the Lakers or Clippers or Knicks or Nets.

But when teams can go in and play two games in a city, have a day off between uh, which is a little more like baseball scheduling.

I do sense a lot of, um, uh feeling around the league that they'd like to see that continue in the future.

That's a great note.

It's really given us some good grudge matches to something happens in that first game of the two part home span.

We don't have to wait months to see what happens.

These guys get right back on the court a couple nights later.

It's so fun.

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