{"id":701348,"date":"2026-04-06T12:55:57","date_gmt":"2026-04-06T12:55:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/701348\/"},"modified":"2026-04-06T12:55:57","modified_gmt":"2026-04-06T12:55:57","slug":"player-grades-cavs-vs-pacers-cavs-backourt-leads-the-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/701348\/","title":{"rendered":"Player Grades: Cavs vs Pacers – Cavs backourt leads the way"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Cleveland Cavaliers<\/a> beat the Indiana Pacers on Easter Sunday.<\/p>\n

All grades are based on our usual expectations for each player.<\/p>\n

38 points, 6 assists, 6 rebounds, 1 steal<\/p>\n

This was the Donovan Mitchell show. He set the tone immediately by attacking the paint on every other possession. Mitchell ended the game with a career-high 28 points in the paint, 38 points total before rolling his ankle in the closing minutes.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s hope he\u2019s okay.<\/p>\n

28 points, 7 assists, 4 rebounds, 3 steals, 1 block<\/p>\n

Harden stepped back and buried countless jumpers over the Pacers today. There aren\u2019t many moves in the league that are more unguardable than that. Indiana looked hopeless trying to contain him \u2014 especially when Harden was using his gravity to create openings for his teammates.<\/p>\n

He finished the game hitting 5-11 three-pointers, giving the Cavs enough offensive juice to get over the hump.<\/p>\n

13 points, 5 rebounds, 1 steal<\/p>\n

The Cavs needed Ellis to hit a few three-pointers today. He was the only Cavalier other than Harden to connect on 3+ three-pointers. That extra boost was needed, not only because the rest of the team struggled, but because Ellis himself hadn\u2019t hit that many outside shots in a game since March 13.<\/p>\n

Ellis had been shooting 8-32 from deep in his 10 games before this.<\/p>\n

4 points, 7 rebounds, 5 assists<\/p>\n

Strus had a rough night. He was tangled up more than a few times and suffered an injury to his left wrist as a result. He shot 1-710 from the floor and bricked a dunk.<\/p>\n

He avoids flunking this one because of his contributions elsewhere.<\/p>\n

14 points, 10 rebounds, 2 assists, 1 block<\/p>\n

This is why the Cavs signed Bryant in the summer. Gone are the days of having no viable option in the case of losing both Mobley and Allen to injury. Bryant stepped up and hung a double-double on his former team to help the Cavs win this game.<\/p>\n

Can you rely on Bryant as the starting center in a playoff series? No. But eating innings in the regular season is nothing to scoff at. The Cavs have been needing this.<\/p>\n

5 points, 4 rebounds, 1 assist, 2 blocks<\/p>\n

Porter\u2019s been phased out of the rotation lately. This was his first time playing 20+ minutes in more than a month. I\u2019d say he handled it well, attacking the glass and throwing a bullet pass to the corner for a Nae\u2019Qwan Tomlin three-pointer. More on that later.<\/p>\n

6 points, 3 assists, 2 rebounds<\/p>\n

Schroder can be erratic at times, but this was one of his more neutral games. He was a steady presence, shooting 2-6 from the floor but not sticking out at any point.<\/p>\n

He matched Harden as a team-high plus-12, for whatever that\u2019s worth.<\/p>\n

6 points, 3 rebounds, 1 assist, 3 steals, 1 block<\/p>\n

Nance hasn\u2019t played nearly as big a role as I thought he would when the season began. That said, this was a solid showing from the veteran forward. He had some rough moments, but he also nailed a three-pointer and dunked all over the Pacers at one point.<\/p>\n

His three steals, one of which came at a key point in the fourth quarter, helped the Cavs win this game on the margins.<\/p>\n

3 points, 4 rebounds, 1 block<\/p>\n

Tomlin hasn\u2019t been able to stay on the court recently, as his lack of a three-point shot has buried him in the rotation. Well, he converted on a big one tonight in the fourth quarter. It was only his 22nd make on more than 100 attempts this season. But I\u2019d argue it was his most impactful one.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Cleveland Cavaliers beat the Indiana Pacers on Easter Sunday. All grades are based on our usual expectations…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":701349,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3774],"tags":[7,1236,7814,113,126,3866,6,114],"class_list":{"0":"post-701348","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-indiana-pacers","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-cavs-analysis","10":"tag-cavs-player-grades","11":"tag-indiana","12":"tag-indiana-pacers","13":"tag-indianapacers","14":"tag-nba","15":"tag-pacers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116357875851265705","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701348","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=701348"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701348\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/701349"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=701348"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=701348"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=701348"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}