{"id":664208,"date":"2026-03-18T04:20:37","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T04:20:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/664208\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T04:20:37","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T04:20:37","slug":"evan-mobley-and-james-harden-lead-the-way-as-cavaliers-beat-short-handed-bucks-123-116","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/664208\/","title":{"rendered":"Evan Mobley and James Harden lead the way as Cavaliers beat short-handed Bucks 123-116"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">MILWAUKEE (AP) \u2014 Evan Mobley had 27 points and a season-high 15 rebounds, and James Harden also scored 27 as the Cleveland Cavaliers opened a three-game trip by beating the short-handed Milwaukee Bucks 123-116 on Tuesday night.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Milwaukee\u2019s Giannis Antetokounmpo sat out with a <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/bucks-giannis-antetokounmpo-injury-0c1bff47a47c48849d07bc93eaaa93f1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">left knee hyperextension<\/a> and bone bruise. This was the career-high 32nd game the two-time MVP has missed this season, and the Bucks fell to 11-21 without him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The Bucks also didn\u2019t have Myles Turner because of a right calf strain. Cleveland\u2019s Jarrett Allen missed a sixth straight game because of tendinitis in his right knee.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">In a game featuring 11 ties and 16 lead changes, Cleveland pulled ahead for good 103-100 on Sam Merrill\u2019s 3-pointer with 6:55 remaining, which started an 8-0 run.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Milwaukee cut the lead to 110-106 on an Ousmane Dieng\u2019s 3-pointer with 3:39 left, but Cleveland responded with seven straight points. The Cavs stayed in front by at least five the rest of the way.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Milwaukee\u2019s Kevin Porter Jr. had 25 points and 10 assists. Dieng, Bobby Portis and Ryan Rollins added 19 points each.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Cleveland\u2019s Donovan Mitchell scored 19 points. Merrill added 17 points in his return from a two-game absence due to left hamstring tightness.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Milwaukee\u2019s Taurean Prince played 22 minutes and scored eight points in his first start of the season. Prince, who has played just 10 games this season, returned earlier this month after <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/bucks-taurean-prince-c4884856e8c597346daf1bfeec0778f4\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">undergoing surgery<\/a> in November to repair a herniated disk in his neck.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The Bucks shot 20 of 45 from 3-point range, and their bench outscored Cleveland\u2019s 57-24. The Cavs compensated with a commanding edge from the foul line, going 27 of 34 while the Bucks were 12 of 17.<\/p>\n<p>Up next<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Cavaliers: At Chicago on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Bucks: At Utah on Thursday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"copyright |\">Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MILWAUKEE (AP) \u2014 Evan Mobley had 27 points and a season-high 15 rebounds, and James Harden also scored&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":664209,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3772],"tags":[7,306,305,193,3846,576,560,121,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-664208","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cleveland-cavaliers","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-cavaliers","10":"tag-cleveland","11":"tag-cleveland-cavaliers","12":"tag-clevelandcavaliers","13":"tag-evan-mobley","14":"tag-james-harden","15":"tag-milwaukee-bucks","16":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116248263209611142","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664208","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=664208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/664208\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/664209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=664208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=664208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=664208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}