Bulls vs. Heat Rescheduled After Game Postponed Due to Condensation on United Center Court

The Chicago Bulls and Miami Heat will now play on Jan. 31 after their recent game had to be postponed due to court conditions.

The teams were originally scheduled to play on Jan. 8, but that game was postponed because of an "unplayable" surface.

According to Joel Lorenzi and Joe Vardon of The Athletic, "Water was visible on the court moments before the scheduled local 7 p.m. tip-off, and the situation deteriorated from there, with humidity levels nearly double what they are inside the arena for a typical basketball game, those sources said. It was an unseasonably warm day in greater Chicago, with the Weather Channel listing a temperature in the city of 55 degrees at 8 p.m."

Both teams went through shoot-around while the game was initially delayed, while fans remained in the stands and were updated on the situation by United Center public address announcer Tim Sinclair.

But conditions only worsened.

Per The Athletic, "Two league sources said as of 7:30 p.m. CT, a half hour into the delay, the humidity inside the United Center was nearly 60 percent—it's typically at 30 percent. The ice rink under the floorboards, there for the Chicago Blackhawks, was melting along the edges of the floor. Both teams were back in their locker rooms by 7:50 p.m. CT, many of them shaking their heads that the game may not be played. At 8 p.m. CT, brooms and towels were collecting so much water from the court that arena workers had to squeeze them over buckets."

About two hours after the scheduled tip-off the game was officially postponed.

Both the Bulls and Heat had off days on Jan. 9, but the Blackhawks had a home matchup scheduled against the Washington Capitals. As a result, the league had to find a later date for the game to be played on.