THE weary Cairns Taipans arrive back in the Far North today after braving a horror trip from Singapore.

After playing on Sunday night, the Snakes left the Asian city-state yesterday morning, arriving in Sydney last night.

It was too late for a connecting flight back to Cairns, so the Taipans were forced to overnight in Sydney and will return to the Far North this morning giving them little time to prepare before Friday night’s crucial clash with the Crocs in Townsville.

But that won’t end the Taipans’ busy week. The team returns to Cairns for a match against the Adelaide 36ers at the convention centre on Saturday night.

Alan Black is far from pleased about the travel delays but realised he was not on his own in finding the National Basketball League schedule demanding.

"All clubs go through it," he said of the heavy travel.

"There wouldn’t be a coach in the league that hasn’t complained about the schedule at some stage.

"There’s been a lot of teams that have had harder road trips than this."

Battling the travel will be one of the mental challenges the Taipans face in the lead-up to next month's playoffs.

After this weekend's double-header, the Taipans play five games in 16 days to finish the fixture season and can not afford to take their foot off the throttle given they are in a pitched battle for a spot in the NBL top four.

Cairns meets only teams below it on the ladder in its final seven round games but needs a string of wins to have a chance to take fourth place.

Sunday’s win kept the Snakes in fifth place, just below the Perth Wildcats.

But after losing their two-game series to Perth on points difference the Taipans must finish the season with a better overall record given results between teams are used as a tiebreak if they finish level on the competition ladder.