NFL Season Kicks Off Tonight: Panthers vs. Cardinals in the Hall of Fame Game — How to Watch
Football is officially back. The 2026 NFL season begins tonight, Thursday, August 6, when the Carolina Panthers face the Arizona Cardinals in the annual Pro Football Hall of Fame Game at Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium in Canton, Ohio — the first exhibition matchup of the year and the traditional unofficial start of the NFL season.
How to Watch
Kickoff is set for 8 p.m. ET on NBC, with streaming available on Peacock and fuboTV, according to CBS Sports. Pregame coverage begins at 7 p.m. ET with Football Night in America, broadcasting live from Canton. NBC’s Sunday Night Football announce team will handle the call, with Mike Tirico on play-by-play, Cris Collinsworth as analyst, and Melissa Stark reporting from the sideline, alongside Terry McAulay serving as rules analyst, according to NBC Sports.
Football Night in America’s on-site coverage will be hosted by Maria Taylor, joined by former Dallas Cowboys head coach Jason Garrett, three-time Super Bowl champion Devin McCourty, and NFL insider Mike Florio.
Oddsmakers have the Panthers as 1.5-point favorites, with an over/under of 36.5 points, according to DraftKings Sportsbook lines cited by CBS Sports.
What Makes the Hall of Fame Game Different
Unlike the rest of the preseason slate, the Hall of Fame Game carries extra ceremonial weight. It’s the only NFL matchup played in what CBS Sports calls “Football Heaven” — the stadium located directly next to the Pro Football Hall of Fame itself — and it doubles as the weekend’s celebration of this year’s incoming Hall of Fame class.
That class includes wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald and linebacker Luke Kuechly, both of whom spent their entire careers with the teams that drafted them, along with quarterback Drew Brees, running back Roger Craig, and placekicker Adam Vinatieri, according to NBC Sports. Select inductees are expected to be interviewed both during Football Night in America and throughout the broadcast of the game itself.
Who’s Playing — and Who Isn’t
Both teams enter tonight’s game with new storylines heading into the 2026 season. The Panthers are coming off an 8-9 season that landed them in the playoffs under head coach Dave Canales, the reigning NFC South champion, according to CBS Sports. On the other side, Cardinals first-year head coach Mike LaFleur makes his NFL head coaching debut tonight, following three seasons as the Los Angeles Rams’ offensive coordinator — a tenure highlighted by the Rams fielding one of the NFL’s top offenses in 2025, according to NBC Sports.
Arizona is expected to start quarterback Carson Beck under center, according to CBS Sports. LaFleur confirmed Wednesday that the team’s other notable rookie addition, running back Love — whom the Cardinals made the first running back drafted in the top five since Saquon Barkley in 2018 — will not play in tonight’s game, though he’ll have three additional preseason matchups to prepare for his rookie season.
The Broader NFL Landscape Heading Into Tonight
Tonight’s game arrives amid the usual wave of training camp storylines around the league. According to ESPN’s ongoing training camp coverage, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers continue to manage an unresolved standoff with defensive tackle Vita Vea, who remains without a contract extension and has shown no intention of playing under his current deal or reporting without a trade — a situation ESPN reports the team has no plans to resolve through a trade despite league-wide interest, even as coaches say they’re not yet worried given how early it remains in camp.
Elsewhere around the league, ESPN’s NFL Nation reporters have been tracking depth chart battles, breakout candidates, and roster bubble decisions across all 32 teams as camps have opened throughout the country, with the first full week of preseason games — beyond tonight’s Hall of Fame Game — set to begin later in August.
FAQ
When and where is the 2026 NFL Hall of Fame Game? Thursday, August 6, 2026, at 8 p.m. ET at Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium in Canton, Ohio.
How can I watch the game? It airs on NBC, with streaming available on Peacock and fuboTV. Pregame coverage on Football Night in America begins at 7 p.m. ET.
Who is playing in this year’s Hall of Fame Game? The Carolina Panthers face the Arizona Cardinals, with the Panthers favored by 1.5 points.
Who is in this year’s Pro Football Hall of Fame class? Wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald, linebacker Luke Kuechly, quarterback Drew Brees, running back Roger Craig, and placekicker Adam Vinatieri.
Is this a regular preseason game or something different? It’s the first preseason game of the year and the only one played at the Hall of Fame’s home stadium in Canton, combining an exhibition matchup with a celebration of the incoming Hall of Fame class.
Conclusion
Tonight’s Hall of Fame Game marks the unofficial return of the NFL season, blending a first look at two teams under new circumstances — LaFleur’s head coaching debut in Arizona and Canales’s Panthers building on their playoff return — with a celebration of five newly inducted legends of the game. With training camp storylines like the Vea standoff already shaping storylines around the league, tonight’s kickoff is the first concrete marker that the 2026 season, in earnest, is finally underway.
Sources: NBC Sports, CBS Sports, ESPN (reporting dated August 4-5, 2026).