The Oklahoma City Thunder finally know what their road back to the top looks like.
The NBA released Oklahoma City’s full 2026-27 schedule Thursday, and while there are still two games waiting to be finalized, the defending champions now have a pretty good idea of what the next eight months will look like.
And it starts with a pretty interesting matchup.
The Thunder will open the season on October 20 against the San Antonio Spurs. Then, just two nights later, they’ll be back in Oklahoma City for their home opener against the Denver Nuggets.
That’s about as good as it gets for an opening week.
After spending the last several years building toward a championship, the Thunder won’t have much time to ease into life as the team everyone is chasing.
November could be one of the first real tests. Oklahoma City will play 15 games that month, but 10 of them will come on the road. The Thunder’s longest road trip of the season is four games, running from November 10-15.
There are some friendlier stretches, too.
The Thunder will play 18 home weekend games throughout the season, giving fans plenty of chances to see the defending champions without having to worry about a weeknight. Oklahoma City will also have six homestands of at least three games. The biggest one comes in February.
From February 5-17, the Thunder will play seven straight games at Paycom Center. That could be a huge stretch for a team trying to build momentum heading into the final two months of the season.
Then there are the games that stand out simply because of the date.
The Thunder will spend Christmas Day on the road, taking on the Minnesota Timberwolves in Minneapolis then a week later Oklahoma City will then close out the year at home, continuing their New Year’s Eve tradition with a matchup against the Miami Heat.
And on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the Thunder will head to Dallas to take on the Mavericks.
The schedule is spread out pretty evenly, although January figures to be the busiest month. Oklahoma City will play 16 games in January, compared to just 11 in February.
They’ll play six games in October, 15 in November, 13 in December, 16 in January, 11 in February, 15 in March and six in April.
One thing that could become important as the season progresses is the number of back-to-backs. The Thunder have 13 of them on the schedule, including five home-home sets, four road-road sets, two home-road sets and two road-home sets.
For a team with championship aspirations, managing those stretches will matter. But perhaps the biggest takeaway from the schedule is just how much national attention Oklahoma City is going to receive.
The Thunder are scheduled to appear in 34 nationally televised games, with 15 of those being national exclusives. Nine games will be on NBC/Peacock, eight on Amazon Prime Video, seven on ESPN, four on ABC/ESPN and two more on Peacock. That’s what happens when you win a championship and be a fixture at the top of the NBA standings.
The Thunder aren’t the up-and-coming team anymore. They aren’t the fun young team that everybody is waiting to see take the next step.
They’ve been the defending champions and a team that everyone wants to beat might to night.
Every opponent gets a chance to knock them down. Every road arena will have a little more energy when Oklahoma City comes to town. And every nationally televised game will come with the reminder that the Thunder are now the standard everyone else is chasing.
There are still two games that haven’t been determined. Those will be scheduled during the week of December 6 after the NBA Cup Group Stage and Quarterfinals are completed.
But for the most part, the wait is over. The Thunder know where this journey begins.
San Antonio. October 20.
Now comes the hard part: trying to do it all over again.