The NBA schedule will begin to be announced on Tuesday afternoon when the opening week national TV schedule for ESPN, ABC, and TNT is released along with the Christmas Day schedule. That will set the table for the full schedule release to come in the next week or so, and most expect a heavy dose of the Lakers, Nets, Knicks, and Warriors this season.
While the 3 p.m. ET release on The Jump was still hours away, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski and Tim MacMahon couldn’t help but report three of the Christmas Day matchups. One will be a rematch of the East playoffs between the Hawks and Knicks in Madison Square Garden, where Trae Young will look to continue playing the villain in New York. The expected primetime game is Nets-Lakers at Staples Center, which was always a lock for Christmas, with the only question being whether it’d be in Brooklyn or L.A. The nightcap for Christmas will put Luka Doncic on center stage, as he and the Mavs will head to Utah to face the Jazz.
The Christmas nightcap, per sources: Luka Doncic’s Mavericks face Donovan Mitchell, Rudy Gobert and the Jazz in Salt Lake City. https://t.co/OG8nnC3fxd
— Tim MacMahon (@espn_macmahon) August 17, 2021
That leaves two slots remaining, with many anticipating a Finals rematch in Milwaukee between the Bucks and Suns to fill a fourth spot and it’d be fairly shocking for the Warriors not to also make the Christmas Day cut. That would leave just one other team (possibly the Sixers) to round out the slate, with Hawks-Knicks almost assuredly as the opener at 12:30 p.m. ET, Lakers-Nets in the 8 p.m. ET primetime slot, and Mavs-Jazz as the 10:30 p.m. ET closer.
We’ll find out the official schedule later on Tuesday afternoon, but as always the NBA is stacking its best teams on Christmas for the league’s biggest single day of the regular season.
