When the Chicago Bulls took the court for their penultimate regular-season matchup Friday, only one veteran was on the court to start the game: center Nikola Vučević.
Vučević was matter of fact about the decision to face the Mavericks in Dallas while most other veterans rested, saying the opportunity to play with younger teammates and square off against fellow European Luka Dončić was plenty of appeal to skip a rest game.
“I’m not a big fan of sitting out,” Vučević said.
But there was another goal for Vučević: a first opportunity to play all 82 games of a season.
Vučević has averaged 67.4 games in his 11-year career. And he logged 80 games in 2018-19 during his first All-Star season. In his first full year with the Bulls in 2021-22, a bout with COVID-19 sidelined him for seven games in the second month of the season.
If he plays Sunday in the season finale against the Detroit Pistons at the United Center, Vučević would be the only Bulls player to appear in every game this season.
“I know there’s a lot of talk about the load management that guys take, but I think you also have to look at the fact that the game is so much faster today and points are going up and there’s more possessions, so it’s more taxing on them,” coach Billy Donovan said. “For him as a center, as a big guy to take care of his body the way he has — when you’ve got a player like Vooch, availability is critical. And I give him a lot of credit for how he’s kept himself available.”
As the No. 10 seed in the Eastern Conference, the Bulls will face the ninth-seeded Raptors in a single-elimination game Wednesday in Toronto in the NBA play-in tournament. If they win, the Bulls would play the loser of the 7-8 matchup on the road Friday with a berth in the playoffs on the line.
Donovan praised Vučević’s work ethic as the key to his durability in one of the most physically demanding positions. He described the center as the first player into the gym each day, rarely missing a lift and always putting in extra workouts on the road.
And Vučević is equally staunch about what he eats — when the team brought two cakes into the locker room for his birthday in October, he pawned off the pastries on teammates and staff, citing too much sugar for his in-season diet.
Vučević learned the rigorous lifestyle by example, growing up on basketball courts and in locker rooms with his father, Boro, who played for the Yugoslavian national team and spent an extensive career playing in Europe.
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“At that age, I didn’t realize as much what he was doing,” Vučević said. “But looking back on it now I see how much he was taking care of his body, the way he was eating, all that.”
That education continued when he reached the NBA. Vučević studied the daily routines of Andre Iguodala and Elton Brand during his rookie season in Philadelphia, then modeled himself after teammates such as Jameer Nelson and J.J. Reddick with the Orlando Magic.
Throughout his career, Vučević has learned that each player needs to hone a plan for physical maintenance. But the veteran presences helped shape his meticulous approach to maintaining health.
“You just watch and learn,” Vučević said. “You ask questions and you see things. A lot of it is trying and failing and seeing what works for you and what doesn’t. As you get older, you get to know your body better.”
Vučević also credits his wife’s role in protecting his sleep schedule during the season, ensuring that their children don’t wake him up early after late night games or red-eye flights home. And if he logs his 82nd game Sunday, he hopes the milestone will stand as a testament to the work put in by his family to support his lengthy career.
With only 24 hours left before the season finale, Vučević joked that he would be keeping an extra eye out to avoid slipping in the shower or tripping over his children’s toys before Sunday’s noon tipoff.
“I’m so close to doing it, I really want to get there,” Vučević said. “It’s very hard to do. Not a lot of people are able to do it so it’s something I just want to do for myself. It speaks a lot to my continuity, staying healthy.”
