The Cleveland Cavaliers have been one of the better defensive teams in the NBA to this point in the 2024-25 regular season. Cleveland ranks 12th in the league in defensive rating, 12th in defensive rebounds and seventh in steals per game.
Cavaliers guard Donovan Mitchell certainly isn’t renowned for his defensive chops, but he explained that Cleveland is experimenting with different schemes on that side of the ball in order to help the squad prepare for the playoffs.
“I think we’re trying different schemes that we haven’t done in the past,” Mitchell said. “I think because we want to A: be playoff ready. You don’t want to be just a one-scheme team and then when the playoffs come, you don’t really know what you want to do. So, we’re trying different things and different lineups. Sometimes the two bigs aren’t out there. Sometimes the low man’s a smaller defender. Just getting accustomed to it. That’s what we’re trying to do to continue to get those reps.
“I’m not too worried. I think we’re using this — and I don’t want to say it’s practice because I don’t want to discredit or disrespect any team — but like there’s going to be things you need to work on and sometimes if you can’t practice, you’ve got to work on it live in game. We’re going to continue to be who we are. We know what we are, what our main defensive principles are. But we’re just trying to find ways to improve, so when it comes April, May, June, you know, we’re not just going on the fly.”
The defensive schemes that the Cavaliers deploy in the 2025 NBA Playoffs could vary from opponent to opponent, as teams score the ball in different ways. For example, the Boston Celtics like to rain down 3s on their opponents, as they’re averaging a league-high 19.2 made 3-pointers per contest.
The Indiana Pacers, on the other hand, have scored almost half of all their points on the season in the painted area.
Maybe no player has been more important to the Cavaliers’ success on the defensive end of the floor than big man Evan Mobley. The 23-year-old has been an anchor for Cleveland, considering he’s averaging 1.1 steals and 1.5 blocks per contest in his fourth season in the NBA.
Mobley has also held opponents he’s guarded to 43.2 percent shooting from the floor this season, or 3.7 percent under their season average.
Though for as solid as the Cavaliers have been defensively overall, they haven’t exactly played lockdown defense in their two most recent contests. In consecutive losses to the Atlanta Hawks on Nov. 27 and Nov. 29, Cleveland allowed the Hawks to score 135 and 117 points respectively.
The Cavaliers had no answers for Hawks guard Trae Young as a scorer and playmaker in those two contests. Young racked up 41 points and a whopping 33 assists during that span, and he dished out 22 dimes in the Nov. 27 matchup alone.
Cleveland will hope to get more stops when it takes on the Celtics on Sunday night in a matchup between teams with the two best records in the Eastern Conference. The best record in the NBA will also be on the line, as the Cavaliers are 17-3 and the Celtics are right behind them in the standings at 16-3.
