{"id":1659,"date":"2025-04-27T00:36:22","date_gmt":"2025-04-27T00:36:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/1659\/"},"modified":"2025-04-27T00:36:22","modified_gmt":"2025-04-27T00:36:22","slug":"cleveland-cavaliers-enter-nba-playoffs-with-win-over-miami-heat-basketball-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/1659\/","title":{"rendered":"Cleveland Cavaliers enter NBA playoffs with win over Miami Heat | Basketball News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"article__subhead\">The Cavs maintain their 12-game unbeaten streak and become the first team to book a spot in the NBA postseason.<\/p>\n<p>The Cleveland Cavaliers have punched their ticket to the NBA playoffs with a hard-fought 112-107 victory over the Miami Heat, thanks to 26 points from\u00a0Donovan Mitchell.<\/p>\n<p>A see-saw battle in Cleveland on Wednesday saw the Heat threaten to end the Cavs\u2019 11-game unbeaten streak after opening up a seven-point lead late in the fourth quarter, but the Cavs clawed back the deficit in the closing minutes to seal their 12th straight victory and a place in the postseason.<\/p>\n<p>The Cavaliers improved their record to 52 wins and 10 losses, maintaining their stranglehold on the Eastern Conference with 20 games of the regular season remaining.<\/p>\n<p>Mitchell was one of six Cleveland players to finish in double figures against a short-handed Miami team missing Andrew Wiggins, Kel\u2019el Ware and Jaime Jaquez Jr.<\/p>\n<p>Evan Mobley backed Mitchell with 16 points and 13 rebounds while Darius Garland finished with 15 points and 10 assists. Bam Adebayo led Miami\u2019s scorers with a game-high 34 points.<\/p>\n<p>The victory though was too close for comfort for Cleveland talisman Mitchell.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt took a collective effort as a group but we locked down and got stops \u2013 but we\u2019ve got to be better,\u201d Mitchell said. \u201cIt\u2019s always good to learn through a win though.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Mitchell played down the significance of Cleveland becoming the first team to reach the postseason.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s definitely a blessing and a sign of our hard work, but it doesn\u2019t really mean much,\u201d Mitchell said. \u201cI\u2019m happy we were able to do it for the crowd, but we\u2019ve got a lot more to accomplish.\u201d<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">\ud83c\udfc0 WEDNESDAY&#8217;S FINAL SCORES \ud83c\udfc0<\/p>\n<p>Donovan Mitchell leads the <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/cavs?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">@cavs<\/a> to their 12th straight win as they become the first team to clinch their place in the <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/NBAPlayoffs?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">#NBAPlayoffs<\/a> presented by Google! <\/p>\n<p>Evan Mobley: 16 PTS, 13 REB<br \/>De&#8217;Andre Hunter: 16 PTS, 5 REB<br \/>Darius Garland: 15 PTS, 10 AST <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/na9zzLdMRY\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/na9zzLdMRY<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 NBA (@NBA) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/NBA\/status\/1897489006067118211?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">March 6, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Celtics keep pace<\/p>\n<p>Cleveland\u2019s nearest pursuers, the Boston Celtics, powered past the Portland Trail Blazers 128-118 after a sensational pair of 40-point performances from Derrick White and Payton Pritchard.<\/p>\n<p>White finished with 41 points while Pritchard erupted for 43, delivering a shooting masterclass that included 10 three-pointers from 16 attempts.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey were tremendous,\u201d Boston coach Joe Mazzulla said of White and Pritchard\u2019s double act. \u201cThe way those two played says a lot about who they are.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey do a lot of the dirty work. So to have a night like this where those two can show what they\u2019re capable of was good for us.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re lucky to have them and it\u2019s a lot of fun to watch them do that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Celtics improved to 44-18 with the win and are eight games behind leaders Cleveland.<\/p>\n<p>In the Western Conference, the Oklahoma City Thunder edged closer to a playoff berth after surging past the Memphis Grizzlies 120-103 on the back of a 41-point performance from Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.<\/p>\n<p>Oklahoma City improved to 51-11 and now lead the West by 11 games from the second-placed Los Angeles Lakers.<\/p>\n<p>In Denver, the Nuggets fought back from a 14-point deficit in the third quarter to score a 116-110 defeat of the Sacramento Kings.<\/p>\n<p>Russell Westbrook led Denver\u2019s scorers with 25 points while Jamal Murray added 24 and Nikola Jokic 22.<\/p>\n<p>Elsewhere, the Milwaukee Bucks kept up their pursuit of the Eastern Conference\u2019s frontrunners with a 137-107 drubbing of the Dallas Mavericks.<\/p>\n<p>Damian Lillard led the Bucks scoring with 34 points while Giannis Antetokounmpo finished with 32 points. The Bucks improved to 36-25 for the season and remain fourth in the Eastern Conference.<\/p>\n<p>In Charlotte, Anthony Edwards and Jaden McDaniels scored 29 points apiece as the Minnesota Timberwolves pulled away to complete a 125-110 win over the Hornets.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Cavs maintain their 12-game unbeaten streak and become the first team to book a spot in the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1660,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[7,6,11,67,275,417,418],"class_list":{"0":"post-1659","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba-playoffs","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-nba-playoffs","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-sport","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-us-canada"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/114407131279831074","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1659","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1659"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1659\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1660"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1659"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1659"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1659"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}