At first glance, fans of the Cleveland Cavaliers should seemingly be bullish on the team’s chances of advancing deep into the 2025 NBA Playoffs. The Cavaliers have been nothing short of dominant in the 2024-25 regular season, as their record of 56-11 is the best in the league.
Additionally, the Cavaliers carved out their longest winning streak in franchise history recently. Cleveland won 16 games in a row, although it saw its streak come to an end at the hands of the Orlando Magic on Sunday.
Still, The Ringer’s Bill Simmons harbors one concern about Cleveland in the playoffs. Specifically, he cited that some of the Cavaliers’ roster doesn’t have a whole lot of experience playing in “massive games.”
“Just saying, it’s — you could go into these playoffs and be 68-14,” Simmons said of the Cavaliers after their loss to the Magic. “But they have a bunch of guys who have never really been in these massive games. [Donovan] Mitchell has. There was some stuff in there that I just am filing away in the back of my head, because I think they’re really good. I still think they’re the favorite in the East.
“But there’s a [De’Andre] Hunter shot at the end of the game in the corner. I’m going to say De’Andre Hunter hasn’t been in a lot of huge games. The game is starting to a feel a little big, right? The streak’s on the line. They go to him, he’s wide open in the corner and hits the side of the backboard. And I was like, ‘Oh, okay.’ Sometimes when the series or the game isn’t working out the way you think it is and all of a sudden you’re in the corner and you’re like, ‘Oh, s—. I gotta make this.’ You haven’t been in that spot. I don’t know, I just filed it away.”
The only two players on Cleveland’s roster who have won an NBA title during their pro careers are big man Tristan Thompson and guard Sam Merrill. Thompson won a title as a member of the Cavaliers back in the year 2016, while Merrill played for the Milwaukee Bucks when the team won the 2021 NBA title.
But it’s also worth noting that Atkinson has won an NBA title during his time in the league’s coaching ranks, even if it was as an assistant coach. He worked for Steve Kerr’s staff when the Golden State Warriors captured the 2022 NBA title. Atkinson’s Warriors beat the Boston Celtics in that year’s championship series.
While multiple players along with Cleveland’s head coach have been atop the NBA mountaintop before, the team’s core of Mitchell, Darius Garland, Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen doesn’t have as much playoff success to their names. None of the Cavaliers’ four best players this season have played past the second round of the playoffs.
Though Cleveland’s stars haven’t even won two playoff series in one playoff run to date, they will try to lead the Cavaliers to four series victories later in the year. Ahead of the 2025 NBA Playoffs, the Cavaliers’ goal should be to finish the regular season with the league’s best record.
Such an accomplishment would secure Cleveland home-court advantage throughout the playoffs, and the Cavaliers have lost just five games at home all season.