Kyrie Irving could make his long-awaited return to the court as soon as Oct. 21 when the Dallas Mavericks open the regular season on the road against the Houston Rockets.Irving last played on March 3, 2025, a game in which he suffered a torn left ACL. Irving missed all of last year recovering from the injury, a slog of a season for the Mavericks, who went 26-56.If Irving can go on Oct. 21 — and all signs are that he’s completely healthy now — more than 19 months will have elapsed between his games for Dallas. The Mavericks badly missed his on-ball wizardry last season, when they finished 27th in points scored per 100 possessions.Masai Ujiri, who was hired as the Mavericks’ president in May, said that he holds “great curiosity” to see Irving and Cooper Flagg play together. So do Mavericks fans, who should finally get that chance in a little more than two months.Dusty May leaving for pros is familiar for Michigan fansAustin MeekHere are some other takeaways about the Mavericks’ 2026-27 regular-season schedule:Difficult opening stretchThe Mavs can’t ease into things. Starting in October, they’ll be thrown into the deep end of the pool and asked to swim. The first six games on their schedule — at Houston, at Indiana, vs. San Antonio, at Miami, vs. Oklahoma City and vs. Houston — are against quality opponents.The Rockets, whom the Mavericks face twice in October, have won 52 games in each of the past two seasons. The Pacers are coming off a down year, but they should have Tyrese Haliburton back in the lineup after he missed all of last season with a torn right Achilles. The Spurs, Heat and Thunder enter this season with title aspirations.The Mavericks started 2-7 last season and finished 30 games under .500. They need to be better prepared to go right away this year, which won’t be easy with so many new faces. The Mavericks have a new coach — Dusty May, who left Michigan for the NBA — two first-round draft picks in Morez Johnson Jr. and Sergio De Larrea to incorporate, plus plenty of other players with previous NBA experience, like Santi Aldama and Zaccharie Risacher, who are first-time Mavericks.Luka’s lone game in DallasLuka Dončić will play his only regular-season game in Dallas on Feb. 28, a matinee matchup that will be broadcast on ABC.The Mavericks and Los Angeles Lakers have played six times since the infamous Dončić-for-Anthony Davis swap in February 2025. The Lakers have won five of them.The Mavericks will play on national TV 21 times this season, a healthy number for a team fresh off a 26-win campaign. Clearly, broadcasters believe there is a large audience for Flagg, the reigning Rookie of the Year.One of the highlights of the Mavericks’ schedule is their Feb. 15 home game against the Philadelphia 76ers, part of a quadruple-header Presidents’ Day slate. That will be the first and only time this regular season that LeBron James comes to Dallas. James shocked the NBA world when he signed a two-year, $8 million deal with Philadelphia last month.Notably, the Mavericks won’t play on Christmas Day for the first time since 2019. They weren’t one of the 10 teams selected to play on one of the NBA’s showcase days.