The Cleveland Cavaliers won their ninth-straight game on Friday night after defeating the Mavericks 134-122 at American Airlines Center.
Evan Mobley, who was recently named Eastern Conference Defensive Player of the Month, scored 34 points (14-21 FG, 3-6 3FG), his second-highest performance of the season. He also had a team-high 10 rebounds.
With the win, the Cavs become the 11th team in NBA history to start a season 30-4 or better and the fourth team to achieve this since 2000.
The Cavs are not just beating teams during this nine-game winning streak but beating teams down. In fact, every game Cleveland has won during the streak has been by 10+ points, which ties their 2008-09 franchise record for most games with a winning margin of 10+ points.
At this point, Cleveland appears to be the best team in the NBA, and they are the best record-wise.
However, we have seen a Donovan Mitchell-led team have the best record in the league and falter when he was with the 2020-21 Utah Jazz, but this seems a little different. To date, Mitchell has not made it past the second round of the playoffs.
In Mitchell’s first year with the Cavs, Cleveland lost to the Knicks in five. The second year, the Cavs made it out of the first round but lost to the Celtics in five. We’ll see what year three looks like, but for now, based on their 30-4 start, anything short of an NBA Finals appearance would be a disappointment.
Three teams that have gone 30-4 since 2000:
2015-16 Warriors: 32-2 (lost in NBA Finals)
2007-08 Celtics: 30-4 (won NBA Finals)
2004-05 Suns: 30-4 (lost in Western Conference Finals)
Notes:
Against the Mavs, Darius Garland moved past World B. Free for No. 13 on the Cavaliers’ all-time scoring list with 6,332 career points.
Evan Mobley moved past Jim Brewer for No.10 on the Cavaliers’ all-time block list with 354 career blocks.
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