Heat back on NBA’s Christmas Day schedule for 2023-24 season, set to host 76ers

Anthony Chiang
·2 min read
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It appears that the Miami Heat will be home for Christmas.

The NBA’s tentative Christmas Day schedule includes a matchup between the Heat and Philadelphia 76ers at Kaseya Center, a league source confirmed to the Miami Herald. The Athletic’s Shams Charania first reported the news Thursday night.

The Heat-76ers matchup is one of five games scheduled for Christmas Day, according to the Athletic. The slate also includes the Milwaukee Bucks at New York Knicks, Boston Celtics at Los Angeles Lakers, Dallas Mavericks at Phoenix Suns and Golden State Warriors at Denver Nuggets.

The NBA’s Christmas Day games will be televised on either ABC or ESPN. The start times of the fives games have not yet been released, with games being played at noon, 2:30 p.m., 5 p.m., 8 p.m. and 10:30 p.m. on the holiday.

This will mark the first time the Heat and 76ers have faced off on Christmas. Miami won two of its three regular-season matchups against Philadelphia last season and the Heat eliminated the 76ers in the second round of the playoffs in the 2021-22 season.

The full schedule for the 2023-24 regular season is expected to be released soon, possibly as early as next week.

The Heat owns an impressive 11-2 all-time record in Christmas Day games. The last time Miami played on Christmas came in 2020, when the Heat earned a 111-98 home win over the New Orleans Pelicans in the second game of the COVID-19 pandemic-shortened 2020-21 season.

It’s not a surprise the Heat was picked for a Christmas Day game this season, as Miami represented the Eastern Conference in the NBA Finals just a few months ago. The Nuggets won the championship series, 4-1, over the Heat.

But the Heat was not selected to play on opening night this upcoming season. The Athletic also reported Thursday that the 2023-24 season will open on Oct. 24 with a two-game slate on TNT that includes the Lakers at Nuggets and Suns at Warriors.

The addition of Damian Lillard would likely lead to more nationally televised games for the Heat this upcoming season. But with Lillard’s trade request to the Heat still unresolved, it remains unclear how the NBA will handle Miami’s place on the national TV schedule for the impending schedule release.