After an overnight flight to Milan, Doc Rivers decided to give his team its first day off of training camp:
By the time the Celtics landed in Milan, it was already 3:45 a.m. local time. It took another 45 minutes to get to the hotel, which meant players and coaches didn’t get into their rooms until about 5 a.m. at the earliest. And then they had to wait for their bags to arrive at their rooms in order to change out of the clothes they had worn on the flight.
Rivers had already been leaning toward giving his players the day off on Saturday before the late night of travel. The fact that many of his players and coaches went to bed after the sun had already began to rise – Rivers told reporters he went to bed at 8:30 a.m. – confirmed to him that he needed to give his guys some rest.
This will be the first day the team has had off since it convened for media day on Friday, Sept. 28. Boston had strung together six consecutive days of practice and then last night’s game in Istanbul. That’s a lot of basketball, and not a lot of time to recover.
“They haven’t had a day off yet,” Rivers said prior to Friday night’s contest against Fenerbahce Ulker. “So it’s probably time to give them a day off.”
The guys will probably crash for a few hours and then hit the streets. I’m so jealous.
They play EA7 Emporio Armani Milano at 12 p.m. on Sunday.
(Image courtesy: Sherrod Blakely)
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
