3 Things to watch as OKC Thunder schedule is revealed

The OKC Thunder will find the traps in their schedule this afternoon; how can they prevent “scheduled losses”?

Despite the need for most fans to act like certain events are not a big deal, scheduled release day is one, even if you can not see it at the time. Let me as, how many times throughout the course of a season have you heard coaches, players, or media members refer to a loss as a “schedule loss”?

No matter if a team is on a back-to-back, playing a grueling three games in four nights stretch, amid a massive stretch of games against contenders, or just on a way-too-long road trip, the schedule plays an enormous part in who wins a game on any given night.

Which team has the rest advantage? Who is in and out of the lineup on a given day? It all matters, and the OKC Thunder can start prepping for these possible traps in the schedule.

One glaring example of why today matters is finding out when you play the Memphis Grizzlies. What if a team gets two, or even three, of their contests against Memphis before the Grizzlies reach their 25-game mark? That would mean you would be lucky enough to evade Ja Morant, who will start the season suspended.

This example came up early in the year last season as the L.A. Clippers coasted into the regular season with a baseball-style season in Bricktown in which they not only gave half-hearted effort but in the two games they only saw Paul George play in one contest while Kawhi Leonard sat out of both matchups against the OKC Thunder. That led to an important baseball-style sweep of the Clippers and eventually earned the Thunder the tiebreaker over the Clippers should they have needed it.

How many back-to-back matchups, three games in four nights, and baseball series segments will the OKC Thunder have on their slate this season? That remains a burning question as we wait for the 2023-24 NBA regular season slate to be revealed.

The NBA will announce the 2023-24 Regular Season schedule at 2 p.m. central time on August 17th, 2023. There will be a special presentation of the schedule on ESPN, and stay locked into Thunderous Intentions for the up-to-the-minute coverage of today’s schedule reveal.