The NBA schedule for Christmas Day is here.
The Athletic’s Shams Charania was the league’s top pick for December 25 on Thursday night, which promises to be another great day of basketball, even as the NFL tries to clinch a spot before the holidays with two games this Christmas.
While we wait for the full schedule to be announced, here’s a look at the five games reportedly set to take place on Christmas Day this season.
The New York Knicks, as they always seem to do, will host a game on Christmas Day to ring in the holiday. The Knicks will host Victor Wembanyama and the San Antonio Spurs in the first game of the day at Madison Square Garden.
With the Spurs coming off their fifth straight season with a losing record and missing the playoffs, and the Knicks coming off their best season in over a decade, the battle between Wembanyama and the Knicks is sure to be an entertaining one.
The Dallas Mavericks, fresh off their first run to the NBA Finals since 2011, will host a Christmas Day game this year. They’ll take on the Minnesota Timberwolves at American Airlines Arena in a rematch of the most recent Western Conference Finals, which Luka Dončić and the Mavericks won 4-1 to reach the Finals. The Timberwolves went 55-26 last season to earn their third straight playoff berth, converting it into their first trip to the conference finals in two decades.
While Dončić and the Mavericks easily routed the Timberwolves in their series last spring, a Christmas Day battle between the two clubs should be a big one. And it will be a good look for the Mavericks with Klay Thompson, who signed with the club after his long stint with the Golden State Warriors.
Although it is not a night game, this game is the best game of the day in the Eastern Conference.
The reigning NBA champions host the Philadelphia 76ers at TD Garden in what could easily be a preview of a thrilling playoff series a few months later. The 76ers have reloaded around Joel Embiid, adding Paul George to their roster after failing to make it out of the first round of the playoffs earlier this spring. The Celtics enter the season as favorites to also win the championship, and it appears they won’t miss a beat in their bid to defend their title.
If there is one match you must watch during the Christmas holidays, during family gatherings, it is this one.
It’s unclear how well these two clubs will actually perform this season, but the Golden State Warriors will host both LeBron James and his son Bronny in a late-night game around Christmas.
The Lakers made the playoffs last year via a play-in game, but were eliminated in the opening round by the Denver Nuggets. The Golden State Warriors missed the playoffs entirely in a rare down year for a franchise that has been so dominant under head coach Steve Kerr.
This certainly isn’t the best matchup of the day. But watching James play Stephen Curry is certainly an entertaining matchup, regardless of how the two teams fare in the West.
The Western Conference’s final game on Christmas could be a success or a failure.
The Denver Nuggets, behind three-time MVP Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray, are easily one of the best teams in the Western Conference and are more than capable of making a second trip to the NBA Finals in three years this spring. But the Suns, despite Devin Booker and Kevin Durant on their roster, have seemed to struggle in recent years. They narrowly lost in the first round of the playoffs and hired Mike Budenholzer to replace Frank Vogel as head coach — just a year after Vogel did the same with Monty Williams.
On paper, this game looks like a classic Christmas game. But with the trends in Phoenix lately, it could easily be a run-of-the-mill game.
