The Dallas Mavericks and Houston Rockets are headed to Macao for the NBA China Games next week, a development that has forced several players to acknowledge that the phrase “Western Conference road trip” can occasionally involve international travel, multiple passports and a globe large enough to be legally considered a warning.
The teams are scheduled to meet in preseason games on Oct. 9 and Oct. 11 at The Venetian Arena, giving the league an opportunity to showcase basketball abroad and giving several players an opportunity to ask whether playing another team from Texas in Asia still counts as a divisional rivalry.
League officials described the event as a celebration of the game’s global reach. Mavericks staff described it more specifically as “a lot of luggage.” Rockets staff reportedly agreed but added that the flight time would at least give everybody another chance to watch Kevin Durant sit in peace while younger teammates ask increasingly unserious questions about Macao, time zones and whether hotel buffets count as carb loading.
Dallas is expected to arrive with the usual Cooper Flagg-related curiosity surrounding the franchise, while Houston will bring the low-key confidence of a team that still gets to say it employs Kevin Durant. Together, both organizations are expected to spend several days pretending jet lag is a mindset rather than a real and humiliating force.
By Friday, league insiders said the educational side of the trip was already underway, with one player reportedly stunned to learn the NBA map extends beyond California, Florida and whichever city his trade rumors currently mention.
