The showdowns and reunions highlighting the NBA’s 2026-27 season

Add NBC News to Google New York Knicks to face Philadelphia 76ers in season tipoff 03:13 Get more news on Share Add NBC News to Google Aug. 13, 2026, 3:00 PM EDT By Andrew Greif The NBA’s offseason was defined by team-switching superstars — which meant that when the league released its schedule Thursday, it was highlighted by those stars’ returns to the cities that once cheered for them.

During the 2026-27 season, Giannis Antetokounmpo will return to Milwaukee following a yearslong drama concerning whether he wanted to stay or leave. Jaylen Brown will play in Boston less than three years removed from bringing the Celtics an NBA championship. And Brown’s new Philadelphia teammate, LeBron James, will revisit Los Angeles after eight years as a Laker.

Whether they will be received warmly or not won’t be known until tipoff. But fans already know now when matchups like that, and other highly anticipated games, will be played.

Only two years after Brown won NBA Finals MVP for Boston, the Celtics traded him to division rival Philadelphia in a move interpreted as the Celtics’ choosing Brown’s former running mate, Jayson Tatum, over him. Brown later said he “threw my phone across the room” after he heard he was being dealt. Rather than hold the juicy reunion early in the season, the league dated his Boston return for Jan. 21 (Prime Video). That game is one of four between the 76ers and the Celtics this season; the others are on Nov. 10 (Prime Video) , Feb. 7 (NBC/Peacock) and March 7 (ABC).

Antetokounmpo’s breakup with Milwaukee, the team that drafted him and with which he won a championship in 2021, was long. The NBA didn’t rush his return to Milwaukee, either. Antetokounmpo’s Miami Heat first visit the Bucks on Jan. 28, near the midway point of the season, when it will be easier to gauge how successful his departure for Miami has gone (Prime Video).

After having spent the first 11 years of his career adored in Portland, guard Damian Lillard left the city in a cantankerous exit in 2023 for Milwaukee to give Antetokounmpo what was supposed to be a championship boost. That partnership never lived up to such expectations, however, and Lillard re-signed with Portland last season but never played a game while he rehabbed a long-term leg injury. That changes this season. If Lillard is healthy to begin the season, as expected, the first home game of his second Portland chapter will take place Oct. 21 against Phoenix.

The Christmas Day slate includes LeBron James in his first game facing the Lakers in Los Angeles since he decided to become a free agent and joined Philadelphia (ABC/ESPN).

Once an All-Star whom the Atlanta Hawks oriented their franchise around, guard Trae Young was traded unceremoniously to Washington last season and played only five games with the Wizards before he signed a long-term extension with the team this offseason. None of those games in a Wizards uniform was against his former team. Young will first play in Atlanta on Nov. 6.

Similar to Young in Atlanta, Ja Morant was once an untouchable trade asset when he launched to superstardom to begin his career in Memphis.