CLEVELAND \u2013 The Cleveland Cavaliers have clinched home-court advantage in the first round of the National Basketball Association (NBA) play-offs, where their likely opponent will be the Atlanta Hawks.<\/p>\n
First, though, the teams have a home-and-home set to play, beginning on April 8 (April 9, Singapore time) in Cleveland.<\/p>\n
Donovan Mitchell, James Harden and the Cavaliers (50-29) locked up at least the No. 4 seed in the Eastern Conference two days earlier, while the Hawks are currently fifth.<\/p>\n
The remainder of the regular season means considerably more to Atlanta (45-34), who are not assured of a top-six finish that would keep them out of the play-in tournament.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe understand the position and the standings and all that,\u201d Hawks forward Jalen Johnson said. \u201cEveryone knows the sense of urgency we\u2019ve had since the All-Star break. We\u2019ve got to take care of some things and go to Cleveland.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Hawks are one game ahead of the sixth-place Toronto Raptors with three remaining. The Philadelphia 76ers and Orlando Magic are tied for seventh, half a game behind Toronto.<\/p>\n
Atlanta missed a golden opportunity to take a commanding hold on fifth on April 6, squandering a 10-point lead in a 108-105 home loss to the New York Knicks. Nickeil Alexander-Walker scored 36 points and first-time All-Star Johnson had 21 points and 11 rebounds.<\/p>\n
January trade acquisition C.J. McCollum buried a three-pointer with 2.2 seconds left to bring the Hawks within one possession, but his 50-footer off the glass that could have forced overtime was a split second after the buzzer.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is like a lesson, a good test for us heading into the post-season,\u201d said Johnson, who is averaging 22.7 points, 10.3 rebounds and 8.0 assists. \u201cThe atmosphere was amazing at the end, big plays by both teams. I was proud of the approach of everyone on the team.\u201d<\/p>\n
Atlanta\u2019s loss actually clinched home court for the Cavaliers, who were in the second half of their 142-126 road rout of the Memphis Grizzlies. Mitchell and Harden had the night off, but fellow veteran guard Dennis Schroder filled in with 22 points and 11 assists.<\/p>\n
Memphis made an NBA-record tying 29 three-pointers, yet no one in the Cleveland locker room was concerned about it, given the circumstances. Craig Porter Jr, Larry Nance Jr, Tyrese Proctor and Nae\u2019Qwan Tomlin all posted double-digit scoring off the bench.<\/p>\n
\u201cGood night for the Cavs. Fifty wins after a 17-16 start is a real credit to this roster,\u201d Cleveland coach Kenny Atkinson said. \u201cSure, we have the superstars, but we\u2019re also 15 deep. All of them are really good.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though the Cavaliers are one game behind the third-placed Knicks with three to play, New York own the tiebreaker. There is a strong argument that they do not want to move up, preferring to potentially meet the No. 1 Detroit Pistons in the second round.<\/p>\n
Atkinson plans to continue alternating days off for his core four, but each will see some action in the back-to-back set with the Hawks, which includes a game on April 10 in Atlanta.<\/p>\n
Keeping Mitchell and Harden healthy, in particular, is critical with the status of rotation forwards Jaylon Tyson (toe) and Dean Wade (ankle) uncertain for the play-offs.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne of the big positives about having to play so many guys because of our injuries is they\u2019re all ready,\u201d Atkinson said. \u201cAnd it always comes up in the play-offs, so we\u2019re going to need some of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
In on-court action on April 7, Kevin Durant scored 24 points against his former team to help inspire the Houston Rockets to a come-from-behind 119-105 victory over the Phoenix Suns.<\/p>\n
Durant, who was traded from Phoenix to Houston in 2025, received a mixed reception upon his return to Arizona, with sections of the Suns home crowd subjecting him to boos throughout a see-saw game.<\/p>\n
Phoenix needed a victory to keep their faint hopes of bagging an automatic play-off spot in the Western Conference alive.<\/p>\n
The Minnesota Timberwolves will instead be assured of the final play-off ticket from the West after cruising to a 124-104 defeat of the struggling Indiana Pacers.<\/p>\n
Also in the West, the injury-hit Los Angeles Lakers drifted further out of contention for the third seed after suffering a 123-87 pummelling to the Oklahoma City Thunder at home.<\/p>\n
The Lakers, whose hopes of mounting a post-season charge have been left in tatters after injuries to Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves, rested LeBron James as Oklahoma City cruised to a lopsided win. REUTERS, AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CLEVELAND \u2013 The Cleveland Cavaliers have clinched home-court advantage in the first round of the National Basketball Association…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":705129,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3776],"tags":[676,208,3874,7,677,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-705128","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-atlanta-hawks","8":"tag-atlanta","9":"tag-atlanta-hawks","10":"tag-atlantahawks","11":"tag-basketball","12":"tag-hawks","13":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116368948844916145","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/705128","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=705128"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/705128\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/705129"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=705128"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=705128"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=705128"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}