The opening weekend of the NBA playoffs produced two road upsets, the league’s strongest first-round television numbers in three years and the return of full-capacity arena crowds, marking what commissioner Adam Silver described as “a clear turning of the page” after six weeks in which the war between Iran and Israel hung over American public life.

In the marquee result Saturday night, the seventh-seeded Sacramento Kings beat the second-seeded Oklahoma City Thunder 118-112 in Game 1 of their Western Conference series, ending an 11-game Thunder home win streak that stretched back to early March. De’Aaron Fox finished with 34 points and nine assists, and the Kings closed the fourth quarter on a 14-2 run after trailing by as many as 13 in the third.

Hours earlier in the East, the sixth-seeded Orlando Magic stunned the third-seeded Milwaukee Bucks 104-99 behind 28 points and 12 rebounds from Paolo Banchero. Giannis Antetokounmpo, playing through a strained left hip flexor he aggravated in the regular-season finale, was held to 19 points on 7-of-19 shooting, his lowest playoff output since 2022.

“You play 82 games to set yourself up, and then it gets thrown out the window in one night,” Bucks coach Doc Rivers told reporters after the loss. “We were a step slow, and they were ready. That’s on us.”

The league said preliminary television figures averaged 4.8 million viewers across the four Saturday games on ABC and TNT, a 22 percent increase over the comparable Saturday in 2025 and the highest first-Saturday number since the 2023 postseason. ESPN executives privately attributed the bump to pent-up audience demand after a stretch in which sports programming repeatedly gave way to war coverage and presidential addresses.

“There’s a thirst for ordinary things again,” said Karen Whitfield, a media analyst at Citi who covers the sports broadcasting sector. “People wanted to watch a basketball game and complain about a missed call. That sounds small, but for two months it was not the dominant national mood.”

Arenas across the country welcomed full-capacity crowds for the first time since the Department of Homeland Security, in coordination with the league, recommended in mid-March that large indoor gatherings reduce attendance by 15 to 20 percent as a precaution against the elevated terror threat advisory. Those advisories were rescinded April 19, four days after the Iran-Israel ceasefire took effect, and the NBA confirmed Thursday that no restrictions remained for the playoffs.

Tickets on the secondary market reflected the shift. Vivid Seats reported its average resale price for a first-round NBA game stood at $312 on Friday, up 38 percent from a week earlier and a level last seen during the 2024 postseason. Demand was strongest for Lakers-Nuggets Game 1, set for Sunday night in Denver, with a get-in price above $230.

“The combination of the ceasefire holding and gas prices coming back down has loosened consumer wallets faster than I expected,” said Marcus Yi, a senior analyst at StubHub. “We saw the same thing in the first week after the prisoner exchange. Discretionary spending on live events is the cleanest read of public sentiment we have, and right now it is pointing up.”

Brent crude settled near $98 a barrel Friday, down sharply from a $125 peak in late March, and AAA reported the national average gasoline price had fallen to $3.41 a gallon, a 27-cent decline over three weeks.

The on-court storylines diverged from the geopolitical backdrop. The defending champion Boston Celtics, the East’s top seed, opened their series against the Miami Heat with a routine 117-95 win, with Jayson Tatum scoring 31. The Western top seed, the Denver Nuggets, faced the Los Angeles Lakers in a series scheduled to begin Sunday at Ball Arena. Nikola Jokic, the three-time MVP, sat out the regular-season finale to rest a sore right wrist that team officials said would not be an issue.

In the other Saturday matchup, the New York Knicks defeated the Philadelphia 76ers 108-101, with Jalen Brunson scoring 36 and Joel Embiid struggling to nine points on 3-of-14 shooting in his return from a left knee procedure that cost him the final eight games of the regular season.

Off the court, the league announced a moment of silence would be observed before Game 1 of every series for U.S. service members killed during the six-week conflict in the Persian Gulf region. The Pentagon’s most recent casualty figure, released April 22, stood at 364 dead and more than 1,100 wounded. The league said it had coordinated with the Defense Department on family ticket allocations and would expand its Hoops for Troops program for the duration of the playoffs.

Silver, speaking to reporters in Brooklyn on Friday, was careful not to overstate the moment. “Sports are not the country’s barometer, and we should be modest about what one weekend means,” he said. “But our arenas are full, our players are healthy, and the basketball has been very good. Those are not small things to be able to say right now.”

Sunday’s slate features four games, including Lakers-Nuggets and the start of the Cleveland Cavaliers’ series against the Indiana Pacers. League officials said additional in-arena tributes for first responders and military families would be rolled out across the second round.