Rivalries That Spice Up the 2026 NBA Playoffs
With apologies to all purists out there, basketball isn’t just a sport. It’s entertainment.
If you watch the NBA solely for pristine execution of double staggered screens and 2-1-2 zone presses, more power to you. Beyond the Xs and Os, though, the playoffs appeal to us on a primal level.
There’s a fighter in each one of us, and when we watch two fierce rivals going at it on the hardcourt, we can’t help but pump our fists, yell excitedly, and tweet in all caps. (With six exclamation points!!!!!! give or take.)
This year, rivalries old and new are set to spice up the postseason. From East to West, the NBA has a bunch of storylines to watch: franchises with decades of enmity, players and coaches with a bone to pick with each other, and even athletes waging a battle against perennial choke jobs.
Get the popcorn ready, folks. Thanks to these five rivalries, the sparks are about to fly in the NBA playoffs.
Thunder vs. Spurs
Want to try your hand at lip-reading? Check out this clip of Sixth Man of the Year winner Keldon Johnson from this past December.
Supposedly, what he’s saying here is: “Frauds! Frauds! F**king frauds!” The target of Johnson’s trash talk: the Oklahoma City Thunder.
It takes tremendous audacity to accuse the reigning, defending NBA champions of being shams, but Johnson had a valid reason to have cojones. At the moment he said this, the Spurs were blowing out the Thunder in front of a roaring crowd at Frost Bank Center, en route to a 130-110 rout. This was San Antonio’s second win in the 2025-26 season series, and just two days later, Victor Wembanyama and company would walk into the Thunder’s home turf and come out victorious again, sealing a 117-102 Christmas Day win.
Fast forward to April, and while OKC has put together another masterpiece of a regular season (finishing with 60+ wins for the second consecutive year), there’s a noticeable blemish on their otherwise immaculate portrait. That blemish is going 1-4 against the squad threatening to knock them off their perch on top of the Western Conference.
When two top-10 teams in both offensive rating and defensive rating eventually cross paths, something has to give. Of course, all has to be well with Victor Wembanyama and Jalen Williams when it comes to health, otherwise we might see upsets.
The Thunder have masterfully navigated injuries to key players like Williams to maintain their stature as a buzzsaw feared around the league. With their healthy 7-foot-4 alien and their vaunted three-guard combo of Stephon Castle, De’Aaron Fox, and Dylan Harper, the Spurs have staked their claim as bona fide title contenders. Can we just fast forward to the Western Conference Finals and watch these two teams battle for seven glorious games?
Celtics vs. Knicks (and Sixers)
If the Thunder vs. the Spurs are a relatively recent construct, the Boston Celtics have been beefing with two squads since…well, since before many of this magazine’s readers were born.
Pop quiz: What’s the most frequent playoff matchup in NBA history? That would be the Celtics taking on the Philadelphia 76ers, who were known as the Syracuse Nationals when they were first dealing with their Boston problem as far back as the 1950s. This year’s first-round matchup will be a record-setting 23rd time that the Celtics will be facing the 76ers in the playoffs.
Philly is Tyrese Maxey’s team now, and he’ll have his hands full as the Sixers try to become the latest play-in team to go on a deep playoff run.
No. 2 on the list of most frequent playoff matchups is Celtics vs. Knicks. When this rivalry was renewed in the 2025 playoffs, things took a nasty turn for Boston as Jayson Tatum went down with a ruptured Achilles. That was a second-round series, and if these two powerhouses in the East take care of business over the next two weeks, they’ll meet up in the conference semis again.
If the Celtics and the Knicks, currently down 1-2 against Atlanta in round one, do set up a 16th playoff series in their shared history, will Tatum be able to go the distance and lead his team to a conquest of New York this time around?
LeBron James vs. Ime Udoka
No, I’m not talking about the Houston Rockets head coach coming out of retirement and playing perimeter defense against the 41-year-old freight train that is LeBron James, who has led LA to a 2-0 series lead over their Texas counterparts.
Instead, I’m referring to a verbal altercation back in December 2023. During a Rockets-Lakers game, Udoka and James were so audibly jaw-jacking with each other that a referee whistled both of them for technical fouls. According to reports, Udoka had called James the B word and the Lakers superstar didn’t take too kindly to that.
On top of that, Udoka went viral again when he appeared to make a certain request to Lakers head coach JJ Redick. In the viral clip, Udoka looked like he was pleading with Redick to put Bronny James into the game as the Lakers led by seven with just 30 seconds left in the fourth quarter. (This time, Udoka might have used the MF word. Yikes.)
This is the same Bronny James, of course, whose father angrily confronted ESPN personality Stephen A. Smith at a Lakers game to defend his honor. So many things are weighing on LeBron’s mind in the Lakers’ first-round series against the Rockets, and amidst the flashes of wanting Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves to accelerate their healing, James might very well be ruminating on Udoka’s trash talk. Fascinating stuff, indeed.
Nikola Jokic vs. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
On multiple occasions, Nikola Jokic has dispelled the notion that NBA individual awards matter to him. According to Jokic, team success trumps all.
Does anyone truly believe the Joker when he says that? If the oddsmakers are to be believed, Jokic is on the verge of losing the MVP race for a second consecutive year. To the same guy, I might add.
Last year, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander ate and left no crumbs. OKC’s franchise player denied Jokic a fourth NBA MVP award, conquered the Western Conference Finals, and powered the Thunder to an epic Game 7 victory to win the NBA championship. Oh, and he claimed the Finals MVP trophy that Jokic was hoisting just three years ago.
Here’s where it became personal: In the 2025 Western Conference semis, SGA and Jokic waged war for a full seven games. By the mighty hand of Gilgeous-Alexander, Jokic and his troops went down in the series finale, where they were humbled by a 125-93 blowout.
This year, the one-upsmanship between Gilgeous-Alexander and Jokic continues as they once again contend for the MVP award. Could their respective teams collide once again in the playoffs? The way OKC and Denver have positioned themselves in the bracket, the only time they’ll cross paths is if they both make it to the Western Conference Finals. OKC is ahead 2-0 against Phoenix, while Denver now finds itself in a 1-2 hole against another rival in Minnesota. Thunder vs. Spurs is a mouth-watering prospect, but Thunder vs. Nuggets could be a must-see attraction as well.
James Harden vs. Game 7
There’s only thing more compelling than bitter rival vs. bitter rival. That would be top-tier athlete versus himself.
Truth be told, James Harden has one heck of a rivalry against his own subpar performance in Game 7s. While Harden is a revolutionary scoring machine in the regular season, recently climbing to no. 9 on the list of all-time leaders in scoring, his track record when the chips are down leaves a lot to be desired.
In his 17-year career, Harden has amassed a 3-4 record in Game 7s. That doesn’t sound too bad, until you realize that this man hasn’t emerged victorious in a Game 7 since the 2020 playoffs in the NBA’s Florida “bubble.” (Yep, it’s been that long.)
Harden’s last two Game 7 performances have heightened his notoriety as an unreliable clutch player. As Joel Embiid’s running mate in Philadelphia, the former MVP coughed up just nine points on 3-for-11 shooting from the field when the Sixers were eliminated by the Celtics in 2023. Just last year, Harden had a chance to lead a Clippers upset over the Nuggets. In that particular Game 7, he could only muster seven points on an even worse 2-for-8 shooting clip.
Now that Harden is with the Cleveland Cavaliers, who are ahead 2-1 vs. Toronto, will Donovan Mitchell and Kenny Atkinson experience the same frustrations that the Sixers and Clippers felt in years past? Forget the Raptors and the Pistons: Harden has a formidable rival right in front of him, and it’s the same one he sees when he brushes his beard in front of a mirror.
