Houston Rockets guard Eric Gordon remains on schedule to return to the team in late December, according to an update Friday from The Athletic‘s Kelly Iko.

Gordon underwent surgery on his right knee on Nov. 11, with the team announcing at the time that he was expected to miss about six weeks.

In Friday’s update, Iko writes:

Gordon and I had a brief chat earlier this month, and he indicated to me that his recovery is going well, that it was very necessary, and that he’s still on course for his originally targeted return, two weeks from now. If I were a betting man, I’d give a 60 percent chance he plays Christmas Day in San Francisco and a 90 percent chance he’s available Dec. 31, at home against Denver.

Christmas Day will also be Gordon’s 31st birthday.

The knee problem may have contributed to Gordon’s much worse than expected start to the 2019-20 NBA season. In nine games, the 6-foot-3 guard shot 30.9% overall and 28.4% from three-point range. Both figures are well below the 41.4% and 36.4% percentages logged over Gordon’s first three seasons in Houston, and his points per game average dipped from 16.8 over his initial three years to 10.9 this season.

“It will clean up some things,” head coach Mike D’Antoni said in November of Gordon’s procedure. “It’s been bothering him actually since the middle of last year. I think he’s actually relieved that he can clean it up, get it going, so he can come back as strong as ever.”

About a week later, Gordon largely echoed that assessment in comments to local media in Houston.

Regarding his knee, Gordon said:

It just got worse over time, and it was really affecting what I do. I couldn’t be as athletic as I wanted to be, and that was something I was really working on. That’s what I was worried about, more the rehab and doing things to keep me out there on the floor, instead of just worrying about playing. But I’ll get back to that here very soon.

Now in his fourth season with the Rockets, Gordon has averaged 16.6 points (36.1% on three-pointers) in 31.2 minutes per game with the franchise. He was the NBA’s Sixth Man of the Year award winner in the 2016-17 season, his first in Houston, and is expected to again be a spark plug off D’Antoni’s bench upon his return later this month.

Gordon signed a multi-year contract extension with the Rockets in early September, which keeps him under contract with the team through at least the 2022-23 season. The timing of that deal makes him ineligible to be traded this season.