It's bad enough that the NBA annually sends the Utah Jazz off on a lengthy pre-Christmas road trip, but when you factor in bad weather and airline hassles, things can get real ugly real fast.
That's what happened to the Jazz Tuesday, when their noon flight was canceled until 4:30 p.m. and didn't actually depart until 6 p.m. because Delta had problems scraping together a crew of flight attendants. By the time the players reached their hotel rooms in frigid Minneapolis, it was after 10 p.m.They won't get much sympathy from the Timberwolves, however, who face Utah Wednesday night at the Target Center. While the Jazz were airborne, the T-Wolves were losing an overtime game to the Hawks in Atlanta.
Coach Jerry Sloan knows that this isn't an ideal time for a road trip, what with the holidays rapidly approaching, but he says it doesn't have to be as bad as some players make it.
"It's always a tough trip," he said, "but if the guys keep their minds on basketball (instead of Christmas shopping, etc.), it's a pretty good time to be on the road."
Guard John Crotty said the Jazz actually may be better off on the road now. They have won three road games in a row.
"We just have to stay loose and execute," he said. "We seem to execute better on the road, anyway."
Veteran Antoine Carr, who gets his first look at the NBA's other Big Dog (rookie Glenn Robinson) when the Jazz play in Milwaukee, said road trips are something you just have to live with.
"I can deal with it," he said. "It's just part of basketball. I have no problem with biting people on the road."
Second-year forward Bryon Russell said the hard part of a road schedule is the back-to-back games, such as the Jazz face in opening this trip with Minnesota on Wednesday, the Washington Bullets on Thursday. But Russell noted that last year's pre-Yule road excursion, in which the Jazz went 4-1, made the holidays that much more enjoyable.
"It was nice for us to go win on the road, then come back to a home-cooked meal and get to relax for a couple of days," he said.