Shorthanded Cavs Snap Losing Streak As They Survive Against The Bulls

The Cleveland Cavaliers were without both Evan Mobley and Darius Garland against the Chicago Bulls. However, they were able to come away with a 103-102 victory.

The night didn't start off great for the Cavs as they learned that they would be without two of their starters in Darius Garland and Evan Mobley. This meant that both Kevin Love and Caris LeVert would slide into the starting five in their absence. 

This didn't stop the Cavs as they broke their three-game losing streak with a 103-102 victory in the Windy City.

LeVert and Love stepped up and each put on solid performances in Garland and Mobley's absence. LeVert ended with a game-high 23 points and also had seven rebounds and four assists. Love added 20 points and nine rebounds of his own. 

The rest of the bench also came up big as well. They outscore Chicago's reserves 37-27 which included 12 points from Cedi Osman, 11 points from Isaac Okoro, and 9 points from Robin Lopez.

The Cavs needed to shut down Zach LaVine or DeMar DeRozan if they wanted to win this game. They did a great job playing defense against both of them as LaVine finished with just 15 points and DeRozan had 21.

This included great defense from LeVert on DeRozan which forced him to a fadeaway for the final shot of the game. 

The @cavs end 2022 on a winning note!#LetEmKnow pic.twitter.com/lS0anyVI0L

— Bally Sports Cleveland (@BallySportsCLE) January 1, 2023

Even though the Cavs got the win, there are definitely areas that the team needs to improve on. They were outscored by the Bulls in the second half as they came out in the third quarter extremely flat. They also committed a total of 21 turnovers in the game which lead to 20 points for Chicago. It's on simple things too such as soft passes or not holding onto the ball. 

Thankfully, these didn't come back to hurt Cleveland as they were able to come away with the win.

The Cavs have back-to-back games against the Bulls. Both teams will travel to Cleveland to play the second game on Monday night at 7:00 PM EST. 

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