Larry Nance Jr. Says NBA Needs to Crown Champion This Season

Even though there’s no certainty that the NBA will resume its 2019-20 season, Cleveland Cavaliers big man Larry Nance Jr. believes it is important that the league crowns a champion this year.

During a conference call, Nance said he was optimistic that the NBA will resume its season after suspending play on March 11 because of the spread of the novel coronavirus.

Despite the fact that the Cavaliers have likely been eliminated from playoff contention, Nance hopes that teams that have played well enough to make the playoffs get a chance to compete for a title.

“We’re not in position to win a championship this year,” Nance said. “But if I was, if I was Giannis [Antetokounmpo], if I was LeBron [James], if I was Kawhi [Leonard], if I was on one of those championship caliber teams I’d be pretty upset about it because it’s very rare in this league that a chance like this comes along and that’s taken a valuable year off someone’s career.”

The Cavaliers had the worst record in the Eastern Conference this season, but Nance was playing well off the bench for the team before the regular season was suspended.

He was averaging a career-high 10.1 points per game this season. He was also averaging 7.3 rebounds and 2.2 assists per game.

Nance was one of several Cavaliers players to return to the team’s training facility when it reopened on Friday for the first time since March. He said he was ready to return to the court because of health and safety measures implemented by the team during the lockdown.