NBA announces finalized 2021-22 schedule for 75th anniversary
The NBA’s 75th season is only a couple of months away and it will hopefully be the first time playing all 82 games since the 2018-19 campaign.
On Friday afternoon, the league officially announced the entire schedule for the 2021-22 regular season, which will begin on Oct. 19, 2021, and end on April 10, 2022. With nearly 30 former Kentucky Wildcats expected to suit up on day one for an NBA roster, it’s going to be another Big Blue-filled year of watching professional hoops.
Let’s jump into some quick notes before diving into Kentucky-related games.
As referenced earlier, this will be the first 82-game schedule since the 2018-19 campaign. 2019-20 was cut short due to COVID-19 and 2020-21 was purposefully trimmed down to make room for a compressed schedule. With this also being the NBA’s 75th anniversary, it intends to include 75 Classic Matchups that will “celebrate the teams, players, coaches and moments that have defined 75 years of NBA basketball.”
The play-in tournament is also returning and will take place from April 12-15 (Tuesday-Friday) with the start of the 2022 NBA Playoffs scheduled for April 16. As far as nationally televised games (ESPN, ABC, TNT, NBATV, etc.), the Los Angeles Lakers will make the most appearances with 42, followed by the Golden State Warriors (41), Brooklyn Nets (38), Milwaukee Bucks (36), Phoenix Suns (34), Boston Celtics (33), and New York Knicks (29).
Now, roughly 30 former Kentucky Wildcats is going to be a lot to keep up with (by my count, there should be 29 on opening night if we include the two rookies who were drafted in July). So we’re going to focus on a handful of games throughout the season that will be especially exciting for the BBN.
Oct. 22: Suns (Booker) @ Lakers (Davis, Monk) ESPN
Nov. 17: Kings (Fox) @ Timberwolves (Towns) NBA League Pass
Dec. 18: Rockets (Wall) @ Pistons (Diallo, Lyles) NBA League Pass
Jan. 17: Pacers (Jackson) @ Clippers (Boston) NBA League Pass
Feb. 25: Heat (Adebayo, Herro) @ Knicks (Knox, Noel, Quickley, Randle) ESPN
March 16: Thunder (Gilgeous-Alexander) @ Spurs (Johnson) NBA League Pass
April 7: Celtics (Kanter) @ Bucks TNT
Basketball season is already inching closer.
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