Recap

The Portland Trail Blazers face unique travel disadvantages this season due to a combination of NBA scheduling decisions and geographic location.

Flight Paths

Several of our flight paths seem uncommon this season. Since the 2015-16 season, only one other team has played a San Antonio ⇢ Minnesota back-to-back — and this marks the first recorded New York ⇢ Atlanta ⇢ Toronto travel route for a Western Conference team.

Note

This trip includes an international back-to-back: Apr 3 @ TOR and Apr 4 @ CHI.

Division Spread

The Northwest Division is noticeably more spread out than the NBA's other divisions — making travel a significant factor throughout the season.

Note

Portland ⇢ Minneapolis is 1,400 miles.

While the perimeter around the Atlantic Division is 1,000 miles — the perimeter around the Northwest Division is 3,600 miles.

Schedule Density

According to our internal data, 3-games-in-4-nights are more problematic for NBA teams than 5-in-7 sequences. To start the 2024-25 season, 16 of our first 18 games are 3-in-4s (tied for most the in the NBA) — and 8 of our first 18 games are part of overlapping 3-in-4 sequences (also tied for most in the NBA, shown in red below).

Sun

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

Fri

Sat

Oct 23

GSW

24

25

NOP

26

27

NOP

28

@SAC

29

30

@LAC

31

Nov 1

OKC

2

@PHX

3

4

@NOP

5

6

7

@SAS

8

@MIN

9

10

MEM

11

12

MIN

13

MIN

14

15

16

17

ATL

18

19

20

@OKC

21

22

@HOU

23

@HOU

24

25

@MEM

26

27

@IND

28

29

SAC

30

Note

Portland plays as many 3-in-4 sequences as Denver and Utah combined to start the season — despite all three teams playing in the same division.