The Phoenix Suns and their fans finally got their hands on the NBA's 2025-26 schedule, and there was lots to like about it from the perspective of The Valley. Not only will the team play on national television nine times - which let's face it is unexpected given many casual fans couldn't name their starting five for next season - but February is going to be a kind month to them.
The Suns will leave Phoenix only twice, and will spend much of the time before and after the All-Star break welcoming opponents to Footprint Center. If the team can tread water until that point - a big ask but a goal worth having - then this could be the run of games that propels them into an unexpected play-in spot.
Suns have been done dirty by back-to-back breakdown.
The good news ends there however, as Devin Booker and company have been done no favors by the league when it comes to back-to-back games for themselves and opponents. As the below graph highlights - and credit to data lover Owen Phillips for putting it together - the Suns have the second worst run of games when coming off back-to-backs themselves, versus when their opponents do.
NBA released the 2025-26 schedule which means we can look at how often teams are playing back-to-backs vs. how often they're *facing* an opponent that's on a b2b
— Owen Phillips (@owenlhjphillips) August 14, 2025
opponent b2bs are ~equally important, but are not distributed as evenly as team b2bs pic.twitter.com/NxVzsfAh2t
Take the Dallas Mavericks for example, who got the luckiest break here in that on 14 occasions this coming season they will face a team while on the second night of a back-to-back themselves. Far from ideal, until you consider there will be a whopping 18 occasions when the oppoent they are facing will be on their second night of a back-to-back instead.
Contrast that with the Suns, who will be on night two of games 16 times, while on only 13 occasions will they benefit from their opponents being in this position. Perhaps this is the payback for that aforementioned February run that could be of massive help to them. Back-to-backs in general have been criticized for a long time for the toll they take on player's bodies though, so this doesn't help.
This situation would have been made even worse if the Suns were still an older roster who didn't defend and were trying to contend for a championship. At least now they have a trio of rookies who can eat more minutes with less reps on their bodies for when the schedule begins to grind on this group hard.
Only the Denver Nuggets have it worse - but when you also boast a three-time league MVP and perhaps the best home court advantage in the entire NBA - it is harder to feel sorry for them. For the Suns though this is just one of many obstacles they are going to have to overcome in what could be a tricky season for the organization.