NBA Schedule

2022/23 NBA Schedules By Team

The NBA has officially unveiled its full regular season schedule for 2022/23.

The season will begin on Tuesday, October 18 and wrap up Sunday, April 9. The play-in tournament will take place from April 11-14, with the playoffs beginning on April 15.

The league’s announcement highlighted the fact that the estimated average miles traveled per team in 2022/23 has been reduced to 41,000, which is a new record low since the NBA has had 30 teams and played an 82-game season.

The league also confirmed several previously reported marquee matchups, including its five-game Christmas Day slate, an opening night doubleheader of Sixers at Celtics and Lakers at Warriors, and games taking place in Mexico City and Paris.

Listed below are links to the full 2022/23 season schedules for each NBA team, organized by conference and division. The team-by-team schedules for ’22/23 can also be viewed in a single document right here, while the full schedule by date can be viewed here.


EASTERN CONFERENCE

Atlantic Division

Central Division

Southeast Division


WESTERN CONFERENCE

Northwest Division

Pacific Division

Southwest Division

And-Ones: Election Day, Free Agent History, Kurucs, Hall Of Fame

In an effort to encourage fans, players, staff members and arena workers to vote in the midterm elections, the NBA will not play any games on Election Day, Tuesday, November 8, the league’s communications department tweets. The scheduling decision came out of the league’s focus on promoting nonpartisan civic engagement. Some of the league’s practice facilities and arenas have been used as polling places.

We have more from around the basketball world:

  • Ben Wallace, Shawn Marion and Kevin Durant. Those are some of the players chosen by HoopsHype’s Frank Urbina as the best free agent signings in the history of the Pistons, Mavericks and Warriors, respectively. Urbina makes his top free agent selections for every team in the league.
  • Former NBA forward Rodions Kurucs is close to signing with Spanish team Real Betis Baloncesto, Emiliano Carchia of Sportando reports. Kurucs has appeared in 131 NBA games, including a total of 21 with Brooklyn, Milwaukee and Houston during the 2020/21 campaign. He played with KK Partizan in Serbia last season. Kurucs saw action in four Summer League contests with the Raptors last month.
  • Manu Ginobili will be presented by longtime Spurs teammate and Hall of Fame inductee Tim Duncan during this year’s enshrinement ceremony on September 10, according to Hoophall.comIsiah Thomas will be among five Hall of Famers to present Tim Hardaway.

NBA To Release Full 2022/23 Schedule On Wednesday

9:04am: The NBA’s schedule announcement is set for 3:00 pm Eastern time (2:00 pm CT) on Wednesday, the league has confirmed (via Twitter).


7:50am: The NBA will announce its full schedule for the 2022/23 regular season on Wednesday, league sources tell veteran reporter Marc Stein (Twitter link).

A handful of key matchups on the coming season’s schedule have been reported in recent days, including all five Christmas Day games and a Warriors/Lakers season opener.

According to Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link), the Celtics and Sixers will also play in Boston on opening night, which will fall on Tuesday, October 18.

Other newly reported matchups from the NBA’s opening week include the Suns hosting the Mavericks on October 19 after being blown out in Phoenix in Game 7 of the Western Conference Semifinals by that same Dallas team (Twitter link via Charania); and the new-look Timberwolves hosting Rudy Gobert‘s old team, the Jazz, on October 21 (Twitter link via Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports). The Wolves will visit Utah for the first time on December 9, Haynes reports.

The fact that the season will officially begin on October 18 means that Monday, October 17 will be a key deadline to watch. That will be the last day for teams to set their 15-man rosters for the regular season, to convert Exhibit 10 contracts into two-way deals, to complete sign-and-trades, and to sign players to rookie scale extensions.

Knicks-Sixers, Bucks-Celtics Confirmed For Christmas Day

The Knicks will host the Sixers at Madison Square Garden on Christmas Day this year, as shared by Sixers superstar James Harden (Twitter link). Veteran NBA reporter Marc Stein confirmed the tweet with his own social media post.

In addition, Shams Charania of The Athletic reports (via Twitter) that the Celtics will host the Bucks. Boston beat Milwaukee in seven games during the second round of the playoffs last season.

New York hosting teams on Christmas has become a regular occurrence, but with the team missing the playoffs last year, it was fair to wonder if it would happen again in 2022. Philadelphia playing Miami also would’ve made sense, as the Sixers signed P.J. Tucker in free agency and the teams met in the postseason.

With these two games confirmed, the NBA’s planned Christmas Day schedule is now known, though the league has yet to confirm it. The other reported matchups are Grizzlies-Warriors, Lakers-Mavericks and Suns-Nuggets.

Warriors, Grizzlies To Meet On Christmas Day

More details are emerging about the NBA schedule, including a Christmas Day contest with the Warriors hosting the Grizzlies, tweets league insider Marc Stein.

It will be a rematch of their hotly contested Western Conference semifinals series that Golden State won 4-2 on its way to the championship. That intense series is remembered for an ejection and a one-game suspension for Memphis’ Dillon Brooks for a hard foul that left Gary Payton II with a fractured elbow.

It will mark the first Christmas Day appearance for the Grizzlies in their 27-year history, dating back to their days in Vancouver. The team’s popularity has increased with last season’s playoff run and the emergence of Ja Morant as one of the league’s most exciting players. The Warriors are a perennial part of the Christmas schedule and defeated the Suns in Phoenix last December 25.

Stein reported earlier today that the Lakers will travel to Dallas for another Christmas Day matchup. The NBA typically schedules five games on the holiday, which is the first major national showcase of the new season.

League sources tell Stein that the full schedule for the 2022/23 season is expected to be released this week (Twitter link).

Warriors To Host Lakers On Opening Night

The Warriors will open their title defense season by hosting the Lakers on the first night of the 2022/23 campaign, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link). As Charania notes, Golden State will also give championship rings to those who were with the team last season. The ring ceremony and game are scheduled to be televised by TNT.

The Warriors are coming off their fourth title victory in the past eight seasons. They finished with the third-best record in the Western Conference last season (53-29), trailing only the Grizzlies (56-26) and Suns (64-18). The team lost a handful of players, including Gary Payton II and Otto Porter Jr., in free agency, but still has its core group.

The Lakers had a disappointing campaign last season. The team dealt with several injuries to key players, preventing the star trio of Russell Westbrook, LeBron James and Anthony Davis – along with the supporting group – from developing chemistry. At 33-49, they finished 11th in the West.

The full NBA schedule is expected to be released in the near future. The only other schedule-related news also involves the Lakers, as veteran NBA reporter Marc Stein reported (via Twitter) they’re likely to visit the Mavericks on Christmas Day this year.

NBA Schedule Not Expected For At Least Another Week

Everyone eagerly anticipating the release of the schedule for the 2022/23 season will have to wait a little longer, according to NBA insider Marc Stein (Twitter link). Sources tell Stein that the schedule isn’t expected to be revealed until after next week, which puts the date sometime in mid-August.

The league typically releases its schedule during the second week of August, although that has been affected over the past two years by shortened offseasons caused by the pandemic. Last year’s schedule was announced on August 20.

Possible trades involving Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving and Donovan Mitchell may be slowing the process this summer as the schedule makers wait to see if any of those situations get resolved before locking in prime TV dates.

A few things are known about the upcoming season, including league-wide media days on September 26, followed by the start of training camps a day later. The Pistons and Bulls will travel to France for the January 19 NBA Paris Game, according to the league’s website, and All-Star Weekend is set for February 17-19 in Salt Lake City.

The preseason schedule is virtually set and will begin with the defending champion Warriors facing the Wizards in Tokyo for a pair of games September 30 and October 2. The Raptors and Jazz will meet October 2 in Edmonton, the Bucks and Hawks will square off October 6 and 8 in Abu Dhabi, and the Raptors and Celtics will play Oct. 15 in Montreal.

Based on past schedules, the 2022/23 regular season will likely tip off on October 18.

And-Ones: Kerr, Schofield, Lopez, Harrell, Play-In, McClung, Harrison

Would less be more? When it comes to the NBA schedule, Warriors coach Steve Kerr believes so. He’d like to see the NBA cut its regular season from 82 games to 72, Monte Poole of NBC Sports Bay Area writes. That would encourage coaches to play their regulars more often, instead of giving them nights off, particularly as the season winds down.

What makes the most sense is cutting back to maybe a 72-game schedule,” Kerr said. “Take 10 games off and get more time to rest in between games. I think you’ll get buy-in from the teams to play their guys more often.”

We have more tidbits from around the basketball world:

  • Magic forward Admiral Schofield was fined $20K, while Magic center Robin Lopez and Hornets center Montrezl Harrell were fined $15K for their roles in an on-court altercation on Thursday, the NBA announced (Twitter link). All three were ejected during the fourth-quarter scuffle (video link).
  • Commissioner Adam Silver likes the way the play-in tournament has encouraged teams on the playoff bubble to remain competitive but might tweak it in future years, Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic tweets. Executive VP of basketball strategy and analytics Evan Wasch suggested the league would consider a scenario where the ninth- and 10th-place finishers in each conference would have to win a certain number of games to qualify for the play-in.
  • Guard Mac McClung was named NBA G League Rookie of the Year after averaging 21.6 PPG and 7.6 APG for the South Bay Lakers, the league tweets. The Lakers rewarded McClung with a two-way contract on Saturday.
  • Free agent guard Shaquille Harrison has been named G League Defensive Player of the Year, according to a league press release. Harrison averaged 1.93 steals per game for the Delaware Blue Coats.

NBA Reschedules 11 Postponed Games

The NBA has announced the rescheduling of the 11 games postponed in December due to COVID-19 issues, listing the changes in a press release.

Additionally, eight other scheduled games have been shifted to accommodate the postponements. A pair of others have been shifted to new starting times.

Most notably, Kyle Lowry‘s return to Toronto will take place two days earlier than anticipated, as Tim Bontemps of ESPN points out.

The Raptors will now host the Bulls on February 3 instead of the Heat. Lowry’s return will occur on Feb. 1 in Miami’s rescheduled visit. The game that Toronto was originally scheduled to play that day against the Hawks will now be played on January 31.

The first two makeups will occur next week — the Nets at the Trail Blazers on Monday, January 10 and the Pistons at the Bulls on Tues, Jan. 11.

“There’s no easy way to do this,” Nets coach Steve Nash said to Bontemps and other media members. “If we were expecting it to be a sweet little add to the schedule, and no blood drawn, that would be foolish.”

The other rescheduled dates are as follows:

  • New Orleans Pelicans at Philadelphia 76ers
    • Previous: Dec. 19
    • New: Jan. 25
  • Denver Nuggets at Brooklyn Nets
    • Previous: Dec. 19
    • New: Jan. 26
  • Toronto Raptors at Chicago Bulls
    • Previous: Dec. 22
    • New: Jan. 26
  • Chicago Bulls at Toronto Raptors
    • Previous: Dec. 16
    • New: Feb. 3
  • Miami Heat at San Antonio Spurs
    • Previous: Dec. 29
    • New: Feb. 3
  • Washington Wizards at Brooklyn Nets
    • Previous: Dec. 21
    • New: Feb. 17
  • Orlando Magic at Toronto Raptors
    • Previous: Dec. 20
    • New: March 4
  • Golden State Warriors at Denver Nuggets
    • Previous: Dec. 30
    • New: March 7
  • Cleveland Cavaliers at Atlanta Hawks
    • Previous: Dec. 19
    • New: March 31

And-Ones: 2023 World Cup, Offseason Grades, M. Miller

The draw for the 2023 FIBA World Cup qualifiers took place on Tuesday. According to a press release from FIBA, Team USA’s qualifying group in the Americas event will include Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Cuba.

The 2023 World Cup will take place in the Philippines, Japan, and Indonesia two years from now, while the first qualifying matches will take place in November 2021. During the qualifiers for the 2019 World Cup, Team USA fielded a team made up of G League standouts, since those events overlapped with the NBA season. That roster made up of NBAGL vets put up a 10-2 record in qualifying games, so I’d expect a similar approach this time around.

Here are a few more odds and ends from around the basketball world:

  • In a pair of Insider-only stories for ESPN.com, Kevin Pelton handed out offseason grades for all the teams in both the Eastern Conference and Western Conference. The Hawks and Wizards were the two teams to earn an A, while the Cavaliers and Pelicans were the only two to receive a D.
  • Former Raptors forward Malcolm Miller has signed with Italian team Vanoli Cremona for the 2021/22 season, the club announced in a press release. Miller appeared in 53 total games across three seasons with Toronto from 2017-20 and was a member of the championship squad in 2019.
  • Although the NBA’s 2021/22 schedule will still include some MLB-style two-game sets between the same teams in the same arena, there will be just 23 of them this season, compared to 84 in 2020/21, writes Marc Stein (subscription required). As Stein explains, not playing in front of fans last season – along with a desire to reduce travel – made those sets a logical addition to the schedule, but the league was less motivated to include them this time around.