With just a few weeks until the start of the 2025–26 NBA season, ESPN has pulled back the curtain on one of the major concerns for a year that sees the basketball media landscape shift: How will the network handle broadcasting the popular TNT pre- and postgame show Inside The NBA.
The show, which features beloved host Ernie Johnson and analysts Charles Barkley, Shaquille O'Neal and Kenny Smith, was a staple on TNT for 36 years as Turner Sports broadcast NBA games. The show will now air on ESPN and ABC, tied to marquee dates on the basketball calendar including the season tip-off and the networks' Christmas Day lineup.
In a release Thursday, ESPN announced the 20 dates throughout the 2025–26 regular season that will feature coverage from Inside The NBA. See the full schedule below:
Inside The NBA's Full 2025–26 Regular Season Schedule on ESPN, ABC
ESPN's Arrangement With TNT to Broadcast Inside The NBA
After TNT lost its NBA rights, as the league signed a new deal with ESPN and added NBC and Prime Video as partners through the 2035–36 season, the network opted to license the popular show out to ESPN.
TNT still employs Barkley, Johnson, O'Neal and Smith and will produce the show that will be broadcast on ESPN and ABC. The arrangement led to concerns that the Disney-owned networks would mandate a stripped down, shorter version of the show that would often go deep into the night on TNT. Barkley has frequently expressed concern over how the new network will handle this, but ESPN has maintained that it wants the show to stay largely the same, and with Thursday's release, we have a bit more information on how that will work:
Inside the NBA pregame shows airing on ESPN will begin one hour before tipoff, with the postgame shows starting immediately after game coverage has concluded. The pregame shows on ABC will begin 30 minutes prior to tipoff. The postgame shows following NBA Saturday Primetime on ABC will start immediately after the game on ABC and continue on the ESPN App.
They may be constrained to streaming on the ESPN App (which, given ESPN's push for the platform, could be partially by design), but the Worldwide Leader seems like its ready to let Chuck, Ernie & Co. go long.
Will Inside The NBA Air During the Playoffs?
Yes, and it sounds like it will be an even bigger factor for ESPN in the postseason.
Per ESPN's release, Inside The NBA will air "throughout the playoffs," including for the Eastern Conference Finals and NBA Finals in 2026. According to the new rights package, ESPN/ABC are set to air 18 games across the two rounds of the playoffs, and will air a conference finals series in 10 of 11 seasons of the deal (it is not yet clear which year of the deal that NBC and Prime Video will split the two series).
It is fair to assume that ESPN/ABC will want Inside The NBA to be a very active part of its playoff coverage.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Full Schedule for 'Inside The NBA' on ESPN This NBA Season .
