Cavs News: Cavs cruise, 15th spot options, Mitchell finger sprain

Heading into Saturday night’s game against the Detroit Pistons, the Cleveland Cavaliers ideally were looking for a get-right game. Cleveland lost on Wednesday night at the Boston Celtics in a game where Boston controlled much of the second half, and the Cavs had lost three of their four prior games before that contest.

The Cavaliers did take care of business on Saturday, though, and generating some momentum late at Boston didn’t hurt. Nor did playing the Pistons, who are still at the early stages of their rebuild, in fairness, and them not having Cade Cunningham for most of this season hasn’t helped.

Cleveland had a strong close to the second quarter to lead 54-45, after a somewhat uneven half for much of it, and then separated themselves from the visitors in the third quarter. Then, the Cavs were getting out for easy baskets from their defense, and knocking in timely shots to put the game on ice.

In that third, Cleveland outscored Detroit 42-22, and Darius Garland, Evan Mobley and company would go on to cruise, with the Cavs leading by as many as 35 at one point Saturday in a 114-90 W. Garland had 21 points and seven assists, and hit five triples, whereas Mobley picked up another double-double, and registered four blocks.

Caris LeVert, Lamar Stevens and Ricky Rubio made their presences’ felt for the bench as well, and Stevens would be awarded the Cavs’ Junkyard Dog Chain. He had eight points and five rebounds, and was a plus-12 in 22 minutes.

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The Cavaliers recently signed Sam Merrill to a 10-day contract, who has been a sharpshooter for the Cleveland Charge this G League season. Merrill has knocked down nearly 43 percent of his three-point tries in 17 games for the Charge, and could potentially have some more occasional run with the Cavaliers in the week ahead.

It’s likely unrealistic for that to come for Merrill in meaningful minutes, though, and it’s fair to examine other options for the Cavs’ 15th roster spot in the event Merrill doesn’t stick around.

KJG’s Josh Cornelissen suggested three potential options for the Cavaliers to utilize regarding their approach to that last roster spot, whether it’s going for a veteran free agent, or two other options. You can view more on his analysis here.

Thankfully, in the Cavs’ dominant W over the overmatched Pistons on Saturday, Donovan Mitchell’s injury wasn’t too serious. Seeing that in the third quarter, it seemed as if it could’ve been a very concerning one, but it fortunately wasn’t, or so it seems for now.

Donovan Mitchell sprained his finger, per Kelsey Russo of The Athletic, however, it’s a relief it wasn’t a worse result. Mitchell was reportedly probable to return a bit after having fingers on his left hand wrapped, he just didn’t end up coming back, given Cleveland having a huge lead and it wasn’t necessary.

It’s a situation to be monitored in games to come here, but it was obviously better than one might’ve expected after how it looked after Mitchell’s drive.

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There’s been plenty of big-time individual contributions from players with star-level abilities throughout the season, obviously, and others have emerged this year to further prove themselves, such as Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Pascal Siakam and others. The aforementioned Mitchell has had a career year to this point following his trade arrival to Cleveland as well, to that point.

On the flip side, Dan Favale of Bleacher Report recently wrote a piece on ranking the five most disappointing stars from the NBA this season. Kyle Lowry was one of them, along with Fred VanVleet, who has had an awkward campaign on the floor it’s seemed, for multiple reasons.

Thankfully for the Cavs, while the supporting cast has to be more consistent, clearly, they do generally know what they’re getting from their key cogs. Hopefully they can find ways to generate some more production and shooting from the supporting cast, to go with the playmaking help from those guys.

Next up: The Cavaliers will face the Celtics again on Monday night, and try to avenge their loss on Wednesday in Boston.