Warrior's Request To Move Tip-Off To Avoid 49ers Conflict Was Denied By NBA

Bay Area sports fans who wanted to watch the San Francisco 49ers take on the Dallas Cowboys and watch the Golden State Warriors take on the Brooklyn Nets had a choice to make.

They can thank the NBA for that.

The Warriors-Nets game was scheduled to tip off at 5:30 pm PST. The problem is that it conflicted with the Niners-Cowboys divisional round playoff game. So, sensibly, Golden State wanted to push back the start of the game.

The Mercury News' Shayna Rubin reported over the weekend that the team had put in the request, but the league gave a firm "nope."

Golden State's Request Had To Be Signed Off On By All Broadcasters

Rubin noted that kind of request requires a lot of parties signing off on it to approve. This includes all of the broadcasting networks, which in this case included NBC Sports Bay Area, YES Network, and NBA TV.

For some reason, someone decided that they were going toe-to-toe with a highly anticipated, nationally televised playoff game. Even when you have to assume the Venn diagram of Warriors and Niners fans has some significant crossover.

Of course, it makes sense for the Warriors' broadcast audience, but less sense for east coast fans. If tip-off had been pushed back even an hour it would have been at 9:30 pm on the east coast. On a Sunday night no less.

Interestingly, the Dallas Mavericks were successful in moving their game to avoid competing with the 49ers-Cowboys game. Their game against the Los Angeles Clippers was originally scheduled for 5:30 pm CST but was moved up to 1:30 in the afternoon to avoid a conflict.

Who knows whether a slightly later start would've benefitted the Warriors or not, because they lost the game, 120-116.

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Matt is a University of Central Florida graduate and a long-suffering Philadelphia Flyers fan living in Orlando, Florida. He can usually be heard playing guitar, shoe-horning obscure quotes from The Simpsons into conversations, or giving dissertations to captive audiences on why Iron Maiden is the greatest band of all time.