CLEVELAND, Ohio — The Cavs are stepping onto the national stage in a big way this season, with a significant bump in televised games that signals their arrival among the NBA’s elite.
As Wine and Gold Talk podcast host Ethan Sands pointed out, “The Cavs have 24 nationally televised games this year. I think it was around 16 to start last year.”
This 50% increase in national exposure places Cleveland in rarefied air, landing them in the top 10 of all NBA teams for national TV appearances.
The timing couldn’t be better for the Cavaliers.
With the Eastern Conference in flux, Cleveland is positioned to capitalize on power vacuums left by traditional heavyweights.
As cleveland.com Cavs beat reporter Chris Fedor explained, “There are so many different questions about Boston. They don’t have Jayson Tatum. They got rid of Kristaps Porzingis. No more Jrue Holiday. The belief of what Boston is going to be this year is very different than what it’s been in the past.”
This uncertainty extends beyond Boston. “The Indiana Pacers, yeah, they’re the reigning Eastern Conference champions, but the way that they’re currently constructed, that’s not the team that went to the NBA Finals,” Fedor added.
The NBA schedule makers have clearly identified Cleveland as a team on the rise worth showcasing, even selecting them for coveted holiday slots traditionally reserved for the league’s most bankable franchises.
“It makes sense to me that when you’re talking about Holiday slates, which are big marquee games on the NBA schedule every single year, it makes sense that schedule makers would Tab the cabs of all the different Eastern Conference seams that they could choose from,” Fedor noted.
For Cleveland’s young stars, this national spotlight represents a critical opportunity to elevate their profiles in a league desperate for new faces.
Cleveland.com columnist Jimmy Watkins emphasized this point: “It’s good exposure for the Cavs. It’s opportunity again, an opportunity created by a power vacuum. But it’s an opportunity to showcase what they’ve been doing here for the last couple years and build the statuses of [Evan] Mobley’s, Darius Garland’s.”
The increased visibility comes at an interesting time for the franchise.
Without LeBron James, Cleveland is attempting to build a sustainable national brand around a core of young talent.
While Donovan Mitchell brings star power, Watkins observed that Cleveland stands apart from other frequently televised teams: “The Cavs of the teams on this list, besides ironically the Celtics, I would say they’re the only team on this list that doesn’t have like a super duper base of the league type star.”
However, this national spotlight comes with a catch. The schedule’s back end could prove brutally challenging for a team with championship aspirations.
Fedor highlighted a potentially devastating stretch: “20 of the final 33 games that they play this season are on the road. And we’ve seen what tends to happen to a team like the Cavs that has big aspirations... There are going to be a lot of eggs that are being laid at the end of the season from this group.”
For Cleveland, the 2025-26 schedule represents both opportunity and challenge.
The national exposure provides a platform for the team’s young stars to build their brands and for the franchise to establish itself as more than just “LeBron’s former team.” But the physical toll of the demanding schedule, particularly that brutal late-season road stretch, will test the team’s resilience and depth.
The message is clear: the NBA believes in Cleveland’s potential as a marquee attraction.
Now it’s up to the Cavaliers to prove the schedule makers right by delivering compelling basketball that keeps viewers tuning in and, more importantly, delivering wins that solidify their status among the Eastern Conference elite.
Here’s the podcast for this week:
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