Sunday's Service – Round 13

Hi guys, I hope you have all been well and staying healthy as it has been a while since we last caught up. This week I want to talk and compare the differences between this season and prior ones. 

It’s been a little over two years since COVID hit our lives which has forced us to deal with the many challenges it brought. I guess from my perspective I’d like to chat about the impact it has had this season on our preparation as a team, having cancelled games, snap lockdowns and the effects of it on our daily lives. 

I know that it is all relative to our experience and there are people who have gone through far greater hurdles, so I look back on this past period and chuckle to myself as it will all seem a little farfetched when we tell our kids and grandkids on what this time meant to us and many people worldwide.

Pre-COVID in 2019 the NBL was on the rise as one of the most talked about leagues worldwide. We were playing pre-season games against NBA teams, recruiting highly sort after talent from around the globe and garnering the attention of top high school talent in the America wanting to forego their college experience to enter the pros. It was and still is a hot destination for many professionals as the coastal lifestyle of the teams, short season (compared to other countries), and competitiveness of the league attracts and keeps close tabs on the NBL.

In those days the schedule was very balanced and easy going. Each team would generally have one or two tough road trips with having a double-header before heading back for a home stand. It was rare that a team would be on the road for more than five to six days with many road trips being between two to three days. Compare that to now where you can find yourself on the roads for two to three weeks at any given time and even in cases such as Perth and New Zealand be on the road for two or three months. 

Most teams would start a 10-week pre-season block late August, with the scheduled games running from mid-November through to mid-February, followed by a month of finals. In those days we generally played between one to two games a week and on the odd occasion have three game in a week. For example we may play on a Sunday followed by a Friday night game that week and then another game on Sunday. 

Trainings were quite frequent as well with a normal training week consisting of three weights sessions and four or five on-court sessions depending on game days. A typical day at the 36ers looks something like this (which is quite consistent throughout the league); weights in the morning (9am-10:30am), shooting/ Individuals (10:30-11am), film (11am-11:15am), team training (11:15am-1:15pm), shooting and recovery post training (1:15pm-1:45pm). 

This was the 'norm' then, compared to now where covid can change things in the blink of an eye we have to be very malleable and adaptable. Of course it’s much easier said than done as many athletes are creatures of habit. We’ve done things the same way for so long that it becomes difficult to change. I know a player who goes as far as they have to make sure the left sock is on first before the right otherwise the universe is out of balance. Now throw in a couple of snap lockdowns, cancelled games, zoom team sessions and there could be cause for concern.

Now let’s fast-track to post-Christmas 2021. This year the scheduling was constructed under a different model. One that would give the league a chance to stay relatively in front of covid if and when it affected teams and individuals. Our first stint of the covid circus occurred Boxing Day when we came back from a two-day Christmas break. A couple of people on our squad got hit with COVID and because of the close contact rules here in Adelaide we were sent home immediately, required to take a PCR test and told to isolate for seven days. 

We were scheduled to play Perth on the December 28. That game got cancelled right away and would have to be made up later down the track. As this was our first lockdown it caused a lot of confusion, we couldn’t workout, couldn’t touch a basketball or leave the house for seven days and were still scheduled to play the Phoenix at the start of the new year nine days later. We had to get creative with home workouts using chairs, stairs, skipping rope etc. Practice sessions were replaced with Zoom calls and recovery was swapped out with film or any movie that caught your eye.

Post our first lockdown right after Christmas we got out for four days and then BAM, COVID strikes again. This time we were a little more prepared and the club was able to organise strength equipment for us all to have in our houses for the rest of the season. All games got postponed again and our next game scheduled for the January 18 against Perth. These snap lockdowns affected everyone differently, as a whole we were frustrated as we couldn’t play games or even train with each other. 

Routine and regularity get thrown out the window very quickly as you go from seeing the boys every day to not seeing anyone at all for weeks at a time. It was very beneficial for me personally as it gave my quad injury time to heal and have a chance to come back 100 per cent healthy. The only downside of this second lockdown was that 1 was one of a couple of guys on the team to get covid and the timing as such would mean that we would get out of isolation on Monday the 18th, the day before we played the Wildcats.

I was very lucky as having a treadmill in the garage meant I could get a lot of conditioning done. For the guys on our team with little kids it gave them a chance to have more daddy day care time and for the younger guys on the team, lockdown gave them a head-start on Fortnite. Overall it gave our minds and bodies a bit of a break one that we haven’t been accustomed to until the off season. Once again it isn’t what we’re normally used to but it was the reality and had to adjust accordingly. We now have to have a bit more reliance on our individual processes to maintain fitness and sharpness as you couldn’t lean on the team routine to keep you going and focused.

When it rains it pours right! Going from having no games in just over a month we got hit with five games in 11 days with three of those games at home. We were excited to be playing again and had to be ready for anything. Some guys were on load management to ease them back into full play again and we couldn’t train at the rate and frequency quick we would have liked. You have to take advantage of the limited practice times we got and the knowing that everyone will face this type of schedule sooner or later. 

The coaches and our medical team were really big on maintaining healthy bodies so they made sure to tailor the sessions accordingly and stress the importance of recovery. A lot of this fell on players being proactive and very open with communication as to how they were feeling. Something which in prior circumstances you would push through knowing you’d have four to five days before the next game. 

Now that you have a snapshot of the two different viewpoints of comparative NBL seasons, I hope that you can appreciate the little nuances and emotional ride we get to go on as athletes, both positive and negative. Each season brings its own challenges, ours this year just seems to be covid and an ever changing landscape to steer. 

We’re 12 games into our season, 16 more to go in the regular season and just over two months left. We’re prepared for anything and excited to have a flurry of games to push through this back end of the season. If there was anything we have learned through this first part of the year is that things can change in a heartbeat so we have to get back to the things we can control and that's making sure my left sock is on before my right every day when I put on my shoes.