{"id":522072,"date":"2026-01-07T07:58:23","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T07:58:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/522072\/"},"modified":"2026-01-07T07:58:23","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T07:58:23","slug":"cavaliers-rally-late-for-120-116-win-while-handing-the-pacers-a-franchise-record-13th-straight-loss-national","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/522072\/","title":{"rendered":"Cavaliers rally late for 120-116 win while handing the Pacers a franchise-record 13th straight loss | National"},"content":{"rendered":"

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) \u2014 Darius Garland<\/a> scored 14 of his 29 points in the fourth quarter, fueling a late 13-point run that sent the Cleveland Cavaliers past the struggling Indiana Pacers 120-116 on Tuesday for their fourth win in five games.<\/p>\n

Indiana, the defending Eastern Conference champs, lost its 13th straight to set a franchise record in its NBA era. The Pacers are now a league-worst 6-31 and are one loss away from matching the Washington Wizards’ 14-game skid for the league’s longest skid this season.<\/p>\n

The Cavs weren’t even at full strength in this one.<\/p>\n

Coach Kenny Atkinson gave All-Star guard Donovan Mitchell a day off just hours after team officials announced Max Strus was expected to miss at least another month because of a left foot injury. Atkinson said that the updated timeline was not because Strus had suffered a setback. Cleveland also lost forward Dean Wade in the first half with a bruised left knee.<\/p>\n

And yet, Cleveland managed to erase the nine-point deficit they faced entering the fourth quarter. Evan Mobley had 20 points while Jarrett Allen and Sam Merrill each scored 19. Merrill went 6 of 10 on 3-pointers.<\/p>\n

Pascal Siakam led the Pacers with 22 points and Jay Huff tied his season high with 20 points,<\/a> going 7 of 10 from the field wand 4 of 7 on 3s. Andrew Nembhard had 15 points and 11 assists. Indiana played without center Isaiah Jackson, swingman Bennedict Mathurin, forward Obi Toppin and All-Star guard Tyrese Haliburton because of injuries.<\/p>\n

Indiana still had a chance to force overtime in the waning seconds, but couldn’t tie the score as the game turned into a free-throw contest.<\/p>\n

The loss also delayed coach Rick Carlisle’s 1,000th win for yet two more days.<\/p>\n

Up next<\/p>\n

Cavaliers: Visit Minnesota on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Pacers: Travel to Charlotte on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"INDIANAPOLIS (AP) \u2014 Darius Garland scored 14 of his 29 points in the fourth quarter, fueling a late…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":522073,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3774],"tags":[2889,7,72264,113,126,3866,6,446,114,66],"class_list":{"0":"post-522072","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-indiana-pacers","8":"tag-athlete-injuries","9":"tag-basketball","10":"tag-cavaliers-pacers-score","11":"tag-indiana","12":"tag-indiana-pacers","13":"tag-indianapacers","14":"tag-nba","15":"tag-nba-basketball","16":"tag-pacers","17":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115852758773875014","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522072","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=522072"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522072\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/522073"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=522072"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=522072"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=522072"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}