Great Returns and Epic Showdowns in the 2025-26 NBA Season
The 2025-26 NBA regular season promises strong emotions, with several games marked by the return of stars to their former cities and key matchups between contending teams. Most of the schedule for the 30 franchises was recently revealed.
One of the most anticipated moments will be Kevin Durant’s return to Phoenix, wearing the Houston Rockets jersey, on November 24. Four days later, on November 28, Anthony Davis will return to Los Angeles when the Dallas Mavericks face the Lakers in an NBA Cup game.
80 of the 82 games each team will play are now known. The opening week games and those on holidays, along with the NBA Cup schedule, were announced earlier this week.
The season highlights the NBA’s new partnerships with NBC/Comcast and Amazon, as part of the 11-year agreement with these broadcasting entities, along with ESPN/ABC, which will retain the NBA Finals.
Durant’s return to Phoenix, after being traded to Houston in June, will be broadcast on NBC. Meanwhile, Davis, who was traded for Luka Dončić in February in one of the most shocking moves in NBA history, will return to Los Angeles on Amazon Prime.
Lakers and Mavericks will face each other three more times during the season: on January 24 in Dallas, on February 12 in Los Angeles, and on April 5 in Dallas.
On February 1st, exactly one year after the Lakers played at Madison Square Garden against the New York Knicks, only for Dončić’s trade to occur shortly after the game, those two teams will meet again at MSG, this time on NBC.
The current champions, the Oklahoma City Thunder, will also have numerous important matchups, many of them in the second half of the schedule. Durant and the Rockets will visit Oklahoma City for the ring ceremony on opening night (October 21), and Houston will return to Oklahoma City on February 7; the Thunder will make their only trip to Houston on January 15.
The Thunder will face the Minnesota Timberwolves for the first time, their Western Conference Finals rival last season, on November 26 in Oklahoma City, where they will play again on March 15. They will play in Minnesota twice, on December 19 and January 29.
The four matchups between Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who was last season’s MVP, and Nikola Jokić, a three-time MVP for the Denver Nuggets, will take place starting in February, giving both players the opportunity to compete for this season’s award. Denver will travel to Oklahoma City on February 27 and March 9, and the Nuggets will host the Thunder on February 1 and April 10.
That’s not the only potential MVP matchup at the end of the season. The Lakers and Thunder will face each other twice in a short period: in Oklahoma City on April 2nd and in Los Angeles on April 7th.
The Thunder will have four encounters at the end of the season against the favorites of the Eastern Conference, Cleveland, in the Cavaliers on January 19, in Oklahoma City on February 22, and New York, at Madison Square Garden on March 4, and in Oklahoma City on March 29.
The Knicks and Cavaliers will play in New York during opening week (October 22) and on Christmas Day, before a final matchup in Cleveland on February 24.
New York will welcome the resurgent Atlanta Hawks and long-time MSG villain Trae Young for the first time this season on January 2nd. Meanwhile, the Cavaliers will host LeBron James in what could be his last game in Cleveland on January 28th.
Other notable returns of star players are also scheduled.
The pivot Myles Turner, who has only played for the Pacers in his first 11 seasons in the NBA, will return to Indiana on November 3 as a member of the Milwaukee Bucks.
The new LA Clippers center, Brook Lopez, will make his only visit to Milwaukee on March 29.
Desmond Bane, who was traded by the Grizzlies to the Orlando Magic in a blockbuster deal in June, will visit Memphis on January 18.
In consecutive games later that month, the Boston Celtics will welcome two key contributors from their 2023-24 championship team who were traded this summer. Jrue Holiday and the Portland Trail Blazers will visit Boston on January 26, and Kristaps Porzingis and the Hawks will come to town on January 28.
