Back to work: NBA's non-Disney clubs start team workouts

Kevin Love was back on the court in Cleveland. Karl Anthony-Towns got to work in Minnesota and his old coach started to mold his new team in New York.

After six months without one, it felt so good for some NBA teams to practice again that even Allen Iverson might've enjoyed it.

“I’ve never seen a layup drill with such intensity," Atlanta coach Lloyd Pierce said. "We did a full-court layup drill and the guys were clapping and cheering. You know they haven’t practiced in a long time if they’re excited about layup drills.”

The teams that didn't qualify for the restart of the NBA season at Walt Disney World could begin voluntary workouts Wednesday to start preparing for their next game — whenever that is.

“As of right now, we don't know when next season will begin, but there's obviously a lot of work to be done between now and then,” Tom Thibodeau said after the Knicks practiced.

The league allowed those eight clubs (Atlanta, Golden State, New York, Minnesota, Charlotte, Cleveland, Chicago and Detroit) to have voluntary team workouts by creating their own bubbles, where players and staff stay together and are tested daily for the coronavirus.

While the other 22 teams had all played at least eight games at Disney, the bottom eight had been restricted to only voluntary individual workouts since the NBA season was suspended on March 11 because of the pandemic.

Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse in Cleveland had essentially been vacant since then. For a young team like the Cavaliers, the interruption was a double blow since they had just undergone a coaching change and were playing their best ball of the season under J.B. Bickerstaff, who was promoted following John Beilein’s stunning resignation.

Love said it was “paramount” for the team to get together and...