The 2025-26 season has had highs and lows across the NBA. Injuries have played a major part, as we’ve seen several big name superstars go down with Injury. It’s been attributed to the league’s ever-increasing pace. 

The Houston Rockets were perhaps one of the first teams to be hit hard by injury, as starting point guard Fred VanVleet went down with an ACL injury. Tari Eason is also down with Injury, but he’ll be back soon. 

Certainly much sooner than VanVleet.

The Rockets have gotten off to a 13-5 start and have played the fewest games in the league. Houston ranks third in the Western Conference, which was boosted by an 11-2 record in the month of November.

In the previous month, Houston went 2-2, as they struggled out the gate, losing each of their first two contests against the Oklahoma City Thunder and Detroit Pistons. 

Which are two of the league’s best teams, to be fair. 

In December, the going gets significantly easier for the Rockets. At least schedule wise.

On paper, of course.

According to NBA.com’s John Schuhmann, the Rockets have the easiest schedule in December.

Schuhmann explained his calculus.

“The Rockets have the league’s easiest December schedule regarding cumulative opponent winning percentage (.405), though it includes two games against Denver. They were the only team that, prior to Sunday, hadn’t played a back-to-back. Their first was a Nov. 30-Dec. 1 back-to-back in Utah, and their first rest-disadvantage game isn’t until Jan. 16.”

This doesn’t necessarily guarantee wins. Not in the slightest.

The Rockets just got beat by the Utah Jazz on Monday. Utah is 7-13.

They rank 11th in the Western Conference. 

But bottom tier opponents have high-caliber NBA talents also. And good coaches.

They just can’t consistently stack up wins yet. But they get up for matches against the league’s better teams.

Schedule wise, the Rockets have two back-to-back games this month. The first stretch is against the Phoenix Suns and Dallas Mavericks on December 5th and 6th and the second sequence is against the Denver Nuggets and Sacramento Kings on December 20th and 21st.