The start of the 2025 NBA Playoffs is creeping up, but the Cleveland Cavaliers’ best player is dealing with an injury.
Star guard Donovan Mitchell has missed each of Cleveland’s past three contests with an ankle sprain, and the expectation is that he’ll sit out his fourth game in a row when the Cavaliers wrap up their regular-season schedule against the Indiana Pacers on Sunday.
However, Cavaliers insider Chris Fedor has reported that there is no level of worry among folks in the organization about the possibility that he’ll be unavailable when Cleveland kicks off its first-round playoff series next week.
“Star guard Donovan Mitchell’s mild ankle sprain is the only injury of note and even though he is expected to miss a fourth straight game on Sunday, there’s no concern within the organization about his availability for next weekend’s series opener, especially after a productive individual workout back in Cleveland on Friday afternoon,” Fedor wrote. “[Kenny] Atkinson said prior to tipoff in New York that Mitchell would be playing if the outcome of these final few games mattered. Backup point guard Ty Jerome showed no ill effects of an achy knee in back-to-back tune-up games Tuesday and Thursday.”
Mitchell has missed contests against the Chicago Bulls, Pacers and New York Knicks with his ankle injury. Cleveland still won two of those contests without him. The Cavaliers’ only loss in that stretch came when the team fell to the Pacers in a close game earlier this week.
The Cavaliers have very little to play for in their season finale against Indiana, as they already have the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference secured. Cleveland has a 64-17 record on the season and is four games ahead of the No. 2 seed Boston Celtics in the conference standings.
Plus, the Cavaliers have no chance of setting a new franchise record for most wins in a single season even with a victory on Sunday. The 2008-09 Cavaliers hold the record with a whopping 66 victories. The current iteration of the team was on track to break that milestone for much of the campaign but will end up falling just short.
Cleveland will need Mitchell healthy and at his best if the Cavaliers want to achieve their ultimate goal in the 2025 NBA Playoffs and bring another NBA title to the city. Mitchell is just 28 years old, but he has an impressive track record of raising his quality of play as a scorer when the games start to mean more, as he’s averaging 28.1 points per contest for his playoff career.
The first day of the 2025 NBA Playoffs is scheduled for April 19, but it’s not set in stone as to whether Cleveland will play Game 1 of its first-round series on that day.
