THE NBA SCHEDULE IS HERE 🔥 Who is the MUST-WATCH team this season?! 👀 | NBA Today

THE NBA SCHEDULE IS HERE 🔥 Who is the MUST-WATCH team this season?! 👀 | NBA Today

Welcome to NBA Today’s schedule release show. I’m Vanessa Richardson in for Malikica Andrews.200 games are on the slate this season and we’ve gone through and pulled out the best of the best. Opening night sets the tone. Kevin Durant returns to Oklahoma City of course back where it all began as SGA and the Thunder raise their banner on ring night against the Rockets. Then the stage shifts to LA where Steph Curry and Jimmy Butler lead the Warriors into a prime time battle with LeBron, Luca, and the Lakers. And that’s just the beginning. For the 24th straight season, ESPN and ABC bring the NBA to center stage with some of the most electric matchups of the year. Circle January 24th. Right now, ABC’s got a triple header worthy of the spotlight. Joel Embiid invades the Garden to face Jaylen Brunson and the Knicks. Then it’s a Western semis rematch. Steph Curry versus Anthony Edwards. And of course, the night cap. Uh we’re going to have Anthony Davis back in LA. How about that? Where he spent six years. That’s a good one. jump to February 21st. The Rockets revamped roster heads into the Garden where Kevin Durant has been at his best throughout his career, averaging 31 points per game in the Mecca. The very next day, another ABC showcase. Donovan Mitchell and the Cavs meet SGA and the reigning champs. And Nicole Joic takes the Nuggets to the Bay for a heavyweight clash with the Warriors. Oh, March 1st. This is going to be a good one. Wimi under the garden lights. Remember, he dropped 42 there on Christmas. Two weeks later, a Western Conference Finals rematch. Anthony Edwards and the Wolves return to OKC to battle the Thunder once again. Got it. Good. 237 games will be on national television this season. But one of the biggest questions every year, who’s got the most? Lucky for you, we counted. We have the list here of all the top 10 teams with the most national TV games. The Thunder, Lakers, Warriors, and Knicks all lead the way with 34. Following them are the Houston Rockets and Nuggets with 28 apiece. And below them are the Celtics, Cavs, and Mavericks. So many games to get through. 34 national television games for the Lakers, Warriors, Thunder, and Knicks. But Perk, which team is the mustwatch team of the entire 2025, 2026 season. You smell that? You smell it? I can smell it cuz I’m down here. Damn it. The Trill Burgers are cooking. They got an easy money burger that’s at trail burger right now. The Houston Rockets who made the most powerful move this off season by getting Kevin Durant. You already have Baby Jokic and Afro Shangon down there putting up that work what he does in the paint. Aean Thompson is good for two to three highlights athletically every single night. And KD a walking bucket, a artist, a magician with the pieces they already have. Jabari Smith. Every single night is going to be mustsee TV when it comes to the Rockets on both ends of the floor. Eay Udoka is even going to give you some action every now and then because we know he like to get into the to the action and beef. The Houston Rockets are going to be the most watched team this up upcoming season in my opinion. Man, I’m going be honest with you, Big Perk. As much as I want to go against y’all Texas boys, I gotta agree with you 1,000%. Great Pat Rody told me Yeah, a thousand percent, bro. The great Pat Rody told me no rebounds, no rings. This team was the top rebounding team in the league last year. He also told me defense don’t guarantee anything, but without it, you don’t have a chance. This team defended at a high rate. They got the defense. They got the rebounding. They got the coaching. The only thing they needed was a go-to guy down the stretch. So, damn it. You go get the best go-to guy down the stretch that you can get in the game today. So, now you fill that gap. I’m interested to see what this team does. You go get Dorian Finley Smith. You keep your core together with Jabari Smith. You extend him. You got Ahmad Thompson coming back. You go get three centers. You got Sangon who can go get that work down there in the post. You got Capella who can go get those lobs. And you got Adams who beat the hell out of people on the boards. They addressed all weaknesses this offseason. I’m looking forward to watching them boys play too. I’m with you on that, Perk. I don’t know if I’m just nostalgic or you because Steph’s coming towards the last couple years of his career, but guys, to me, it’s the Warriors. Do you remember how good they were when Jimmy Butler was traded from the when Jimmy Butler came over and tra? They’re 23 and seven after Jimmy Butler came over in that trade for the Miami Heat. Now, Steph got hurt in the playoffs and they obviously didn’t go as far as they wanted to go, but I want to see the Warriors back in action with Jimmy Butler with a full training camp. They were so good with him on that roster before Steph Curt that hamstring. And I, you know, I know the Kaminga situation has dragged on all summer. It’s gotten kind of ugly, but I expect him to be back on the team. And even if he isn’t, Steph and Jimmy together have been great. And so I want to see how they come right out of the gates because the last few years they haven’t started fast, but this year they have the potential to build up a nice lead in that West. Who are the champions, my friend? That would be the Oklahoma City Thunder. The last time you just talked about the Warriors, the last time there was a repeat NBA champion was back in 2018, the Golden State Warriors. It has not happened since. Do these Oklahoma City Thunders have it in them to repeat? Everything changes for them. This is a team that didn’t have great expectations. Now they got a championship. Now everybody comes in with a ring. They are known for their humility, but does that change? I remember in 2010, 910 season after the Lakers won, right? I mean, everybody knew Kobe had a PR person and Pal did, but all a sudden DJ Banger and Meta World Peace had a PR person after they won. Is that going to be like that for the Thunder? You know, their guys got paid. There’s three stars or trio. They got up to potentially 800 plus million. Do they change? Do they have the same humility? Do they have the same fight? Do they have the same kumbaya afterwards after games putting their arms around each other? I have to see it. And if there are cracks early, then this protective egg is going to have cracks that people are going to pay attention to. They are mustwatch. Very interesting. And you know, I’m not going to argue with what UD perk said about the Houston Rockets. I am surprised no one said the Lakers because only LeBron knows whether or not year 23 is his final year. Let’s run through some of his key matchups. LeBron versus Steph will see four more chapters added this season. The first meeting coming opening night, of course, October 21st. The two will also meet on February 7th, the three-year anniversary of LeBron James coming to all-time leading scorer in NBA history. LeBron will also renew his career-long rivalry with the Boston Celtics two times in the regular season. LeBron will visit the Boston uh on December 5th, while the Celtics will travel to LA for a second matchup on February 22nd. The kid from Akran returns home. Oh, this is going to be a big one to his beloved fans on January 28th for what could be his final trip there. James has averaged 31 points, nine rebounds, and seven assists in Cleveland as an opponent throughout his career. And lastly, LeBron will visit the Mecca of basketball at Madison Square Garden on February 1st. In his career, James has averaged uh some of his best games. And also, that game last year is the game after Yeah. they made the Luga Dantes trade. Remember they played the Knicks in Madison Square Garden? It was a big game and then all of a sudden boom, bug out of the postgame locker room. There’s that trade. What do you think is the Knicks biggest challenge this season? I’m going to go back to last year and I’m going to go with them boys out of Detroit, the bad boys. Detroit basketball. Listen, I’m telling you, if Detroit wins game three in Detroit, which they very well could have and should have, then we could be having a whole different conversation about how the playoffs went through last year. If you’re a team like Detroit, a young team, you feel like you got slighted. You feel like you should have been in that spot. You do not forget about those moments. I feel like the Detroit Pistons have something to going on that focus on getting back next year. Obviously, they brought in Duncan Robinson. I love Duncan Robinson. I love how he opens up Kate Cunningham. Duncan Robinson pulls triggers for Kate. defenses overreact by the way he moves in his motor. I’m looking at the Detroit Piston. I’m saying everybody’s saying, “Oh, the East is wide open. Oh, the New York Knicks. Oh, Boston is unhealthy.” No, the Detroit Piston sitting right there saying, “Don’t worry about it. We going to be right there.” I’m looking forward to seeing Mike Brown on the sideline at MSG. Uh he’s replacing Tibs. He has two new shooters that they need and Clarkson and Yusel. But what is he going to do with this offense? You know, I I I can see Mike having an offense that makes everybody happy, not just two people happy. Um, two talented people at that, but trying to figure out how to make them more well-rounded, and the expectations are skyhigh. They were in the East Finals. It’s been since 1973. Knicks fans expect this team to go to the finals. And Mike certainly has a lot of pressure, but he’s faced pressure before replacing Phil Jackson and coaching LeBron James and putting some foundation cement in Sacramento. Perk, how about Jaylen Brunson? How about both of their stars, right? And OKC set the bar, especially SGA and Jay Dubb, and showed that it’s two sides of the basketball. And when you talk about the Knicks, you talk about getting rid of Tom Tibido who was a defensive-minded coach and this team wasn’t really good defensively when it mattered the most, especially Big Body Brunson and Cole Anthony Towns. If we’re going to hold certain guys accountable around the league, it got to come, we got to come with the same energy when it comes to those two. They were getting cooked in the Indiana series. They couldn’t figure out what they wanted to do with Carl Anthony Town. Should he be in the drop coverage? Should he switch? Either way, he was getting cooked. Jaylen Brunson, the Indiana Pacers, they were trying to search him out in pick and rolls and trying to find a mismatch to go at him. Those two guys being the the faces of the franchise, they got to get their stuff together and slide those puppies on the perimeter if this team is trying to go to the level that they’re trying to go to. Listen, I know Mike Brown from when he came into Los Angeles to succeed Phil Jackson. He’s obviously not afraid of stepping into some big shoes or into pressure situations, but you guys, they were in the East Finals last year. They were renaming the streets outside of Madison Square Garden. The Knicks got so close and people in New York could taste it. They are expected to get back to the East Finals and then advance. I mean, the expectations for this team are so high. And I know Mike Brown is not afraid. I mean, this people all know Mike Brown. He like rides his Harley-Davidson around the country all summer. You may not think that from like the from the nice suits he wears and stuff. He’s he’s kind of a cool guy. He can turn up a little, but if they they better get off to a good start cuz when you get people in New York thinking that you have finally done it, that Jaylen Brunson is the savior, that you’re this close and you don’t deliver, they got to they got to come out of the gates fast here.

On NBA Today, Kendrick Perkins, Udonis Haslem, Ramona Shelburne and
Marc J. Spears take a look at some of the biggest matchups for the 2025-26 NBA season before discussing the challenges the New York Knicks could face this upcoming season.

0:00 Taking a look at the biggest 2025-26 NBA schedule matchups
2:00 Which is the must-watch team this upcoming season?
7:23 What is the Knicks’ biggest challenge this season?
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