After completing 42 of its 168 playing dates – exactly one-fourth – and 305 of its 1,230-game regular-season slate (thru Tues. Dec. 3), the record shows that an NBA team has been required to compete on consecutive days 83 times (13.6 percent of team performances). Eleven contests pitted both squads playing a second game within 30 hours or so, most often with some air travel involved.
While three of those leg-weary matchups were decided by four points or fewer, the average margin of victory for that set of 11 games is 19.2 ppg. (For the season as a whole thus far, about one game in four is decided by more than 15 points.