Trail Blazers' Schedule Announced for Emirates NBA Cup
Portland's group-play opponents in this year's in-season tournament will be Houston, Sacramento, Minnesota and the Clippers.
The NBA’s in-season tournament is entering its second season. It now has a sponsor and a new name—the “Emirates NBA Cup”—but the format is largely the same as last year’s event, which was won by the Los Angeles Lakers.
Here’s a refresher, if you forgot:
Teams are placed into groups of five, randomly selected within their conferences. They play one game against each of those teams throughout November on Tuesdays and Fridays, which are designated as “Cup Nights.”
The winner of each group, plus one “wild card” in each conference, advances to the single-elimination knockout round in mid-December. The other 22 teams will each have two games scheduled, one at home and one on the road, during that week.
The top four teams travel to Las Vegas to play the semifinal games on Dec. 14 and the championship game on Dec. 17 at T-Mobile Arena.
The Trail Blazers are in “Group A” in the Western Conference this year, alongside the Houston Rockets, Sacramento Kings, Minnesota Timberwolves and LA Clippers.
Here’s their full schedule for group play in November:
🏆 Tuesday, Nov. 12: vs. Minnesota (7 p.m., Moda Center)
🏆 Friday, Nov. 22: at Houston (5 p.m., Toyota Center)
🏆 Friday, Nov. 29: vs. Sacramento (7 p.m., Moda Center)
🏆 Tuesday, Dec. 3: at L.A. Clippers (7:30 p.m., Intuit Dome)
It’s not an easy group. The Wolves are a title contender, and the Rockets, Clippers and Kings are all in the mix of teams pushing for the play-in. It will be a major upset if the Blazers even make it to the knockout round—but the goal of the tournament, besides selling another TV package to Amazon, is to create something for the teams that aren’t in the running to play for. Maybe four of their 20-something wins this season will come on these four days in November and they’ll get in. Stranger things have happened.
Last year, the Blazers’ group-mates were Memphis, Phoenix, Utah and the Lakers. They went 1-3 in group play throughout November, beating the Grizzlies and losing the other three games, and did not qualify for the knockout stage.
The NBA will release the full schedule for the 2024-25 regular season on Thursday.
