The Sixers are headed back into the NBA’s Christmas Day spotlight, and this time the stage comes with a little extra star power.
Philadelphia will visit the Los Angeles Lakers on Christmas Day 2026, ESPN’s Malika Andrews announced on Good Morning America, as part of the league’s five-game holiday slate. It will mark LeBron James’ return to Los Angeles after the last eight years he spent there.
For the Sixers, this is becoming familiar territory. The game will be their seventh Christmas Day appearance since 2017, and James’ move to Philadelphia all but guaranteed they’d land on the league’s marquee schedule again.
The path to this matchup was shaped in part by last month’s stunning Sixers-Celtics trade, the one that sent Jaylen Brown to Boston in exchange for Paul George. That swap opened the door for Brown to head back to Boston on Christmas Day, but Philadelphia’s annual West Coast trip as December turns to January means James gets the holiday spotlight instead.
There’s also a bigger television picture here. With James on the roster, the Sixers are expected to draw 34 national TV games this season, which would be the most any team is allowed. Matchups with teams like the Celtics and Lakers are now set up to be must-watch games.
And the league would love nothing more than to get a long look at Philadelphia’s loaded starting five - Tyrese Maxey, VJ Edgecombe, Brown, James and Joel Embiid - as often as possible. The catch, of course, is availability. Embiid’s injury history and James’ age make it unlikely the Sixers will be at full strength every night over the course of the regular season.
In Other News...
Celtics Schedule Just Sparked A Jaylen Brown Debate Fans Will Feel
The NBAs opening-week schedule gave Boston a pair of early spotlight games, with the Celtics set to open against the Detroit Pistons on October 20 before facing the New York Knicks on October 23. But for Philadelphia fans, the more noticeable detail is what is not there: no Celtics-76ers meeting in that opening stretch and no holiday showdown on Christmas Day, either.
That absence has already fed the kind of leaguewide chatter that tends to follow a marquee Eastern Conference pairing, especially with fans and commentators wondering about the scheduling choices around Jaylen Browns move to Philadelphia. Even without a head-to-head date right away, the setup has only sharpened the curiosity around when the Celtics and 76ers will finally see each other and how much the league may be trying to hold that matchup back for a bigger stage. [Read more 🡒]
Tyrese Maxey Faces A New 76ers Reality With LeBron And Brown
Tyrese Maxey already knows the 76ers are heading into a different kind of season after adding LeBron James and Jaylen Brown, and he is not pretending otherwise. The group has far more star power now, which means more attention, more lineup possibilities and a much different feel for a player who has spent recent seasons growing into one of Philadelphias most important offensive engines.
Maxey has acknowledged the adjustment ahead, while Nick Nurse gets the tricky part of making it all work. With more mouths to feed and more responsibilities to sort out, the rotation and the offensive hierarchy figures to look different on any given night, and how quickly those pieces settle in could shape the early months of Philadelphias new-look roster. [Read more 🡒]
Sixers Land Another Big National Spotlight With Lakers Christmas Showcase
The Sixers are set for another marquee stage in the 2026-27 season, landing a Christmas Day matchup with the Lakers that will air on ABC and ESPN. It is the kind of slot that underscores how often Philadelphia finds itself in the leagues biggest windows, and it adds to a schedule that is already drawing plenty of attention before the calendar has even been unveiled.
Philadelphia also opens with the Knicks on opening night and gets the Cavaliers in its home opener, giving the early part of the season a distinctly spotlight feel. The NBA is still set to release the Cup group-stage schedule and the full slate later this week, so there will be more details to sort through soon, but the headline dates already show the Sixers are again part of the leagues featured programming. [Read more 🡒]