Upcoming NBA exhibition games set to have 10-minute quarters

Starting this week in the NBA-bubble, the world's top basketball players will begin playing exhibition games against each other ahead of the official restart of the 2019-2020 season. Game quarters will only be 10 minutes long to prevent injuries after coming off a long vacation.

The NBA season was officially suspended on March 11 due to the coronavirus pandemic. Players were strongly encouraged to self-isolate in their own homes and most of them complied with the league memo. Today, over four months later, coaches and trainers are concerned that most players are not in the best shape to play competitive games.

According to Bleacher Report, exhibition games are scheduled to start this Wednesday and will go on until the 28th. Official regular season games will begin on the 30th. The NBA will revert exhibition games back to 12-minute quarters starting on the 24th in preparation for the season restart.

Given the long layoff, teams have a unique approach during the exhibition games. Miami Heat coach Erik Spoelstra conferred with Sacramento Kings head coach Luke Walton and Utah Jazz head coach Quin Snyder to discuss whether there is anything specific the teams want to work on since the Heat will be facing both squads in exhibition games.

According to the new format, teams will play scrimmage games as a warm-up. Then, each team will play eight games against each other to simulate the remaining games of the regular season. Playoff seeding will depend on the result of the eight seeding games and their current standings.

Playoff games will then continue with the traditional format. The NBA Finals will also follow the usual seven-game format. The NBA is still trying to figure out how to implement home-court advantage for seeded teams.

If everything goes according to plan, a champion will be crowned by mid-October and a new season can begin by December.

Commissioner Adam Silver released a statement a few weeks ago stating that the season will be shut down again if there is a significant coronavirus outbreak in the NBA bubble community. Several players are concerned that the Disney staff servicing the community poses a significant health risk to the NBA bubble.