The Denver Nuggets have long been known to have one of the NBA’s largest home-court advantages. As a result of the high altitude and the city’s location in the center of other NBA markets, the Nuggets often play tired teams on the back-end of a back-to-back, with the thin air contributing to even more fatigue for their opponents. According to reports, however, the NBA is looking to change this in order to create a more fair schedule for every team.
The following is from Christopher Dempsey of the Denver Post:
So here’s the problem as other teams see it: Denver has too much of an advantage in back-to-back games when the Nuggets are the second leg and said team is coming to play them from anywhere on the West Coast. […] The NBA already has taken action to reduce that advantage through altered scheduling such as making Denver the first stop coming from the east or putting a day off between the games for teams coming from the west.
According to Dan Feldman of Pro Basketball Talk, the Nuggets’ schedule this season does feature fewer home games against opponents on the second night of a back to back, with that number being set at 11 – the sixth fewest in the league. However, many teams may still consider that too big of an unfair advantage. There may be no easy way of fixing this scheduling flaw, mainly as a result of Denver’s geographic location. However, there is one pretty clear solution to this and other problems facing the league: eliminating back-to-backs in general.
