Doc Rivers is looking to put something into the NBA’s suggestion box.
Rivers’ Milwaukee Bucks played on Friday night against the Cavaliers in Cleveland, a game that had a 6:40 CST tip-off time. The game came three days after the Bucks defeated the Oklahoma City Thunder in Las Vegas on Tuesday to win the NBA Cup championship for the 2024-25 season.
Speaking with reporters before the contest, Rivers said that he would like to see the NBA add a couple more days off for the Cup finalists moving forward, per Jim Owczarski of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
Rivers may have been onto something as Milwaukee went on to get blown out by Cleveland by a 124-101 final score. That said though, Oklahoma City, the other NBA Cup finalist, played a day earlier on Thursday and beat the Orlando Magic 105-99. Rivers did also note that he was impressed that the Thunder had managed to do so (OKC also went on to beat the Miami Heat 104-97 on Friday night on the second end of a back-to-back).
The former NBA Coach of the Year Rivers is now in his 26th season as an NBA head coach, so he has seen just about all of the scheduling quirks that the league has had to offer over the years. Though the NBA might not have much sympathy for this suggestion given the Thunder’s success under even more challenging circumstances, Rivers (who has noted throughout the year that his team has felt fatigued at times) is at least trying his luck.
