When the calendar turned to 2025, Luka Dončić was a Dallas Maverick, the Boston Celtics looked like a potential dynasty, and the Milwaukee Bucks were making a Finals push with Giannis Antetokounmpo and Damian Lillard leading the way. A lot can change in 12 months.
As we head into 2026, Luka is a Laker, injuries and the dreaded second apron forced the Celtics to reload on the fly, and the Bucks are fighting for a play-in spot, while contemplating a post-Giannis future. During that interval, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander punctuated a dominant season with a Finals MVP, Tyrese Haliburton became a postseason legend, and the Clippers found new ways to embarrass themselves. These are The 10 Biggest NBA Moments of 2025.
10.Knicks Make Eastern Conference Finals
Date: May 16
The last time the New York Knicks made the Eastern Conference Finals franchise superfan Spike Lee was directing Bamboozled and Timothee Chalamet was still in preschool. But the 25-year drought—which persisted through 14 head coaches, the Isiah Thomas regime, the Phil Jackson era, and countless false saviors—ended this spring in the most unlikely manner: a blowout win over the defending champion Boston Celtics. The Knicks Game 6 win at the Garden sparked a celebration befitting an NBA Championship that was felt from midtown to Mott Haven down to Far Rockaway and everywhere in between. The championship parade was put on hold after the Indiana Pacers ended the Knicks’ postseason run in the next round.—Thomas Golianopoulos
9.Shams’ Report Triggers Giannis Trade Rumors
Date: December 3
The Giannis Antetokounmpo era in Milwaukee produced the franchise’s first NBA Championship since Kareem Abdul-Jabbar led the Bucks to the 1971 title. But the team has endured one playoff failure after another since that post-COVID chip in the summer of 2021. Khris Middleton got old fast and the team unloaded a boatload of assets chasing the next star to pair with the two-time MVP. Nothing worked. With the Bucks off to a slow start, the inevitable occurred: ESPN’s Shams Charania reported that the Bucks and Giannis were having “discussions about his future.” Though the situation might not be resolved until next summer, one thing is certain: a bidding war is on the horizon with the prize being one of the best players in the game.—TG
8.Jayson Tatum Tears His Achilles
Date: May 12
With three minutes remaining in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals, Jayson Tatum, the Boston Celtics four-time All-NBA First Team forward, scrambled for a loose ball and dove to the hardwood. He couldn’t get up on his own power. The diagnosis: a torn Achilles, the latest soft tissue injury to an NBA star. The fallout: disastrous.
The Celtics went into the Knicks series as the defending champs and the favorites to represent the Eastern Conference in the NBA Finals. But their season came to a crashing halt in an instant and altered the trajectory of the franchise. With Tatum likely out for the 2025-26 season, the Celtics traded starters Jrue Holiday and Kristaps Porzingis over the summer in an attempt to get below the second apron salary threshold, ending a potential dynasty before it could even get going.—TG
7.The Mavericks Win the Cooper Flagg Lottery
Date: May 12
Had embattled Mavericks GM Nico Harrison been playing three-dimensional chess all along? Probably not, but his universally panned trade of Luka Dončić to the Lakers did pay a major dividend when the Mavericks were just bad enough to get lucky in the lottery a few months later. Despite a 1.8 percent chance, the Mavs stumbled backward into another franchise talent in Flagg, the teenage frontcourt star out of Duke. Harrison, fired early in the next season, would not get to enjoy the fruits of that fortune. But the Flagg lottery transformed the Luka disaster into, well, a slightly smaller disaster. The biggest winner of all? NBA conspiracy theorists, who will (wrongly) believe for decades that the league steered Luka to L.A. and got the balls to bounce right for Dallas to land Flagg.—Alex Kirshner
6.LeBron James Confronts Stephen A. Smith
Date: March 6
Stephen A’s criticisms of LeBron and his son Bronny, relating to Bronny’s NBA-readiness, led to a courtside confrontation following the Lakers’ 113-109 win over the Knicks that served to merely escalate their ridiculous feud.
“I don’t like his ass,” Smith said on Carmelo Anthony’s podcast, while LeBron landed this burn about Smith enjoying the attention: “He’s going to grab some fucking ice cream out of the freezer and sit in his chair in his tighty-whities.” In the end, America’s most famous athlete got to do what many American sports fans have always wanted to do: chew out Stephen A. Smith. The rest is enjoyable entertainment or mindless garbage depending on your opinion.—Jake Appleman
5.Pablo Torre Breaks the Kawhi Leonard Scandal
Date: September 3
Since its 2023 premiere, Pablo Torre Finds Out has endeavored to marry the investigative journalism world in which Torre cut his teeth with an oversaturated medium in the most effective way possible. For most of the year, the show was best known for its continuous coverage of Bill Belichick’s relationship with his 24-year-old girlfriend. That was until the first week of September, when Torre reported that in 2022, the since-failed environmental fintech company Aspiration allegedly signed Los Angeles Clippers superstar Kawhi Leonard to a dubious $28 million endorsement deal which may have been a means to compensate Leonard outside of the NBA’s salary cap.
Before the start of training camp, the post-Donald Sterling Clippers were at the center of a new scandal in a year marked by scandals and questions of ethics in pro sports. And, mind you, this was before the Clippers sputtered out of the gate to begin the new season and abruptly discarded a retiring Chris Paul in the middle of the night.—Julian Kimble
4.Game 7 of the NBA Finals
Date: June 22
The first NBA Finals Game 7 in almost a decade may always be known as much for Tyrese Haliburton’s Achilles injury as the Thunder’s first championship. The Pacers hung tough in the first half after Haliburton went down; a dominant OKC third quarter set the champs on their way. For OKC—and General Manager Sam Presti’s endless stream of young talent and incoming assets—Haliburton’s injury might have signaled the beginning of a dynasty. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Chet Holmgren, and crew jumped out to a 24-1 start while defending the crown almost as if to prove the first one wasn’t tainted.—JA
3.Game 1 of the NBA Eastern Conference Finals
Date: May 21
Generational pettiness is alive and well, y’all.
Madison Square Garden has seen its fair share of heartbreak, but this May, Tyrese Haliburton authored a fresh chapter. With the Pacers and Knicks trading haymakers in a wild Game 1, Haliburton forced OT with a cold-blooded buzzer-beater—then doubled down with the ultimate troll. As the stunned MSG crowd fell silent, he hit Reggie Miller’s infamous choke gesture, a move forever burned into Indiana–New York lore (and Spike Lee’s psyche). And he did it in the same building where Miller made it iconic.
The Pacers rode that momentum to an overtime win, stealing home-court advantage and lighting up their fanbase. They went on to beat the Knicks in six and advance to the NBA Finals, where Haliburton’s run ended in brutal fashion: an Achilles tear in Game 7 against the Thunder.—Brighid Tully
2.Chauncey Billups and Terry Rozier Arrested
Date: October 23
Every sports league’s nightmare is gambling interests compromising a game, opening up a Pandora’s box of liability and mistrust. The NBA’s came true when federal agents indicted Blazers head coach Billups and journeyman guard Rozier on a litany of gambling offenses. Some were related to illegal poker games, but more troubling for the NBA were the Justice Department’s allegations that gamblers worked with NBA personnel (including Rozier and an unnamed person who matched Billups’ description) to rig prop bets. Both men’s criminal cases are pending. On the one hand, the NBA continues to promote gambling products and apps. On the other hand, players and coaches know exactly what they’re not allowed to do.—AK
1.The Luka Dončić Trade
Date: February 1
On February 1, 2008, the Los Angeles Lakers acquired Pau Gasol from the Memphis Grizzlies for Kwame Brown, Javaris Crittenton, Aaron McKie, the rights to Marc Gasol, and two first round picks, in one of the most lopsided trades in NBA history. The Lakers went on to win back-to-back championships in 2009 and 2010, while the Grizzlies got the full Kwame Brown Experience. Seventeen years to the day of the Gasol trade, the league’s most charmed franchise did it again.
In one of the most shocking moments in sports history, the Dallas Mavericks traded Luka Dončić—a 25-year-old five-time All-NBA first team selection who, eight months earlier had led the Mavs to the NBA Finals—to the Lakers for the oft-injured Anthony Davis, Max Christie, and a 2029 first round pick. No swaps. No future considerations. None of that stuff. How could it be? Shams had to assure readers that he hadn’t been hacked. The discourse was frenzied. The takes flew fast and furious. The consensus was unanimous: The Mavericks got fleeced. Trading Luka was one thing. Trading Luka for that return at a time when Mikel Bridges fetched five firsts for the Brooklyn Nets was malpractice, a fireable offense, and, surely, Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison would soon meet that fate.
The Doncic trade was a seismic event that shifted the balance of power in the NBA. The Mavericks fan base revolted and the team has sputtered since the deal went down. The Lakers reloaded around a generational talent entering his prime just as age started to catch up with the ageless LeBron James. The fallout will be felt for the next decade. And that’s why it’s the biggest NBA moment of 2025.—TG