The Las Vegas Summer League bracket is set for a heavyweight finish, with the Rockets meeting the Grizzlies in one semifinal and the Warriors facing the Lakers in the other, the NBA announced.
Los Angeles was the lone team to go 4-0 in Vegas, while Houston, Memphis and Golden State also reached the semifinal round thanks to better point differentials than other 3-1 teams. The semifinal games are scheduled for 6:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m.
Eastern on Saturday, and the winners will play for the title Sunday at 9:00 p.m. ET.
The league also laid out the rest of the weekend slate in Vegas, which includes five more games Saturday and two on Sunday.
Beyond the Summer League spotlight, ESPN chairman Jimmy Pitaro said Thursday that his network would be interested in working with the NBA on a streaming hub for local broadcasts, a project commissioner Adam Silver said earlier this week the league hopes to launch for the 2027/28 season. Pitaro made the comments at a CNBC/Boardroom event and said, “We’ve made our intentions very clear with with every league, including the NBA, that we want to be part of the solution here,” in reference to teams that lost their regional sports networks when Main Street Sports Group went out of business.
Grant Hill is also looking ahead, and he’s bullish on Team USA’s chances at the 2027 FIBA World Cup. The men’s national team managing director told Joe Vardon of The Athletic that the program has a wave of young players eager to get involved after the U.S. has gone without a medal at the event since 2014.
“You got a lot of young guys who want to be a part of it, which is great,” Hill said. “It’s actually an exciting time.
… We’ll be good. We will be big, we’ll be really good defensively.
We’ll have shooting. … We’ll be fine.
We’ll have an opportunity to win.”
Summer League has also offered an early look at the 2026 draft class, and Zach Kram of ESPN said his first read is that the top four picks have all backed up their pre-draft hype. He also pointed to Bucks guard Brayden Burries and Warriors forward Yaxel Lendeborg as two of the biggest standouts in Vegas outside the top five.
And Fred Katz of The Athletic dug into a different kind of summer waiting game around the league, noting that several situations could stay unresolved until LeBron James makes his next move. Katz pointed to the free agencies of James Harden, Draymond Green and DeMar DeRozan, and also raised the possibility that Peyton Watson’s restricted free agency could be stuck in limbo until the Clippers and Raptors can move forward on their Kawhi Leonard trade. The Clippers, one of the teams interested in a sign-and-trade for Watson, could potentially fold that deal into the Leonard transaction.
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What makes the move notable from a Warriors perspective is the path not taken. Los Angeles had been exploring Jonathan Kuminga as part of its broader roster hunt, but that pursuit never got to the finish line, and the Lakers were not eager to empty out valuable draft assets in a sign-and-trade chase. For now, the pivot to Thybulle says as much about the market as it does about the Lakers' priorities. [Read more 🡒]