NBA And Players Meet Until 3:20 A.M., Still Have Hope For Full Season

The NBA and representatives of the players’ union met yesterday for more than 15 hours, reports the in an attempt to come to terms on a new collective bargaining agreement, Washington Post’s Michael Lee. The two sides wrapped up their meeting at 3:20 a.m., and reportedly have scheduled to reconvene again this afternoon.

Enough progress was made in the talks that the two sides even spoke about potentially still having an 82-game season, according to the paper. Since the lockout’s inception, the league had already made the decision to cancel not only the NBA’s preseason, but also the regular season’s first two weeks. NBA Players Association executive director Billy Hunter however told the paper that he believes if they crunch the schedule to include more back-to-back games they could still fit a complete season if a deal is struck soon.

While many topics were discussed during yesterday’s lengthy talks, one that was avoided was the topic of basketball-related income. This issue may prove to be the biggest gap to bridge between the two sides, as talks broke down last week when the owners were reportedly unwilling to continue negotiations unless the players agreed to an even split of basketball revenues.