Celtics may be unfairly impacted by NBA finals scheduling

(Image: Pixabay CC0) - A landmark study by Australian researchers into jet lag and its impact on NBA performance reveals the Boston Celtics may have a distinct disadvantage in the NBA Finals home games because of jet lag. Senior author Dr Elise Facer-Childs, and her team from the Monash University Turner Institute for Brain and Mental Health in Melbourne, studied the impact of travel-related jet lag on performance. The study has been published in the journal Frontiers in Physiology. The authors argue the effects of jet lag are significant and suggest that the NBA - and other sporting codes - should factor this in when scheduling games where teams have to travel long distances over a number of time zones in a short time period. "NBA teams are often exposed to jet lag due to frequent travel across multiple time zones, with some teams being disproportionately affected based on their geographical location," the authors state in the study. "Travelling eastward could be of particular concern to teams located on the east coast who have to travel back to play home games without adequate recovery time." "Eastward travel—where the destination time is later than the origin time—requires the athlete to shorten their day (known as a phase advance). During phase advance, athletes often struggle to fall asleep at an earlier bedtime, leading to sleep loss and, consequently, potential impaired physiological performance and motivation the next day".