Sports
Cavaliers looking to maintain mastery over lowly Nets
Feb 19, 2026; Cleveland, Ohio, USA; Cleveland Cavaliers guard Dennis Schroder (8) drives to the basket against Brooklyn Nets guard Drake Powell (4) during the second half at Rocket Arena. Mandatory Credit: Ken Blaze-Imagn Images Due to injuries, James Harden and Donovan Mitchell were bystanders on the bench as the Cleveland Cavaliers collapsed late against the best team in the Eastern Conference on Friday night.
Less than 48 hours later, the Cavaliers may be missing their star backcourt duo again when they visit one of the league’s worst teams on Sunday afternoon.
The Cavaliers were one game over .500 following a 117-100 loss at Houston on Dec. 27. Since then they are 20-8 in their past 28 games, though they are on their first slump in two months with three losses in four games.
After losing by a combined 10 points to the Oklahoma City Thunder last Sunday and Milwaukee Bucks on Wednesday, Cleveland lost a nine-point lead in the final 2:44 of regulation and took a 122-119 overtime setback to the Detroit Pistons on Friday.
“There’s no moral victories,” Cavaliers coach Kenny Atkinson said. “This is a big game. We had chances. Just kind of kicking ourselves.”
Harden sat out with a fractured thumb for the second game and Mitchell was held out for the second straight night with a groin injury. While Mitchell is day-to-day, Harden was still feeling discomfort at the shootaround Friday and was sporting a protective brace on the thumb.
The Cavaliers won six of seven with Harden in the lineup and the guard would like to play through the injury if possible, though it is possible he sits out again Sunday ahead of a rematch with the Pistons on Tuesday.
Sam Merrill and Dennis Schroder comprised Cleveland’s starting backcourt Friday and produced mixed results. Merrill scored 20 points on 6-of-14 shooting while Schroder totaled 12 of 4-of-15 shooting and nine assists.
Without Mitchell and Harden again, Cleveland likely will rely on its frontcourt duo of Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen. The duo combined for 48 points, 21 rebounds and five blocked shots Friday.
“I think we did fight with the guys that we had,” Allen said. “I think down the stretch, just the mistakes didn’t lead us to where we wanted to. When we get the guys that are our premier players, then things will be different.”
Besides Mitchell and Harden, the Cavaliers also were missing Dean Wade and Keon Ellis. Wade sat out with a sprained ankle and was replaced in the starting lineup by Jaylon Tyson while Ellis sat out with a fractured index finger.
Cleveland earned a 131-124 win in Brooklyn on Oct. 24 and cruised to a 112-84 rout on Feb. 19. The Cavaliers are 11-1 in the past 12 meetings with the Nets, who matched a season worst with their seventh straight loss on Friday when they took a 148-111 loss to the host Boston Celtics.
It was Brooklyn’s fifth double-digit loss of this skid, and the Nets allowed 66.7% shooting. The Nets allowed their most points in a since a 153-121 loss at Sacramento on Nov. 15, 2022, and it was their fourth-highest field goal percentage allowed in franchise history.
The Nets allowed the Celtics to hit 22 of 34 3s a night after allowing the San Antonio Spurs to make 17 of 43 attempts from behind the arc in a 126-110 loss. The Nets conceded 10 of those 3s in the second half when they surrendered 82 points after trailing by nine at halftime.
“It was a complete-on quit, when you lose by almost 40 points,” coach Jordi Fernandez said after the Nets took their fifth loss by at least 30 points this season and tied a season worst by allowing 22 3s.
–Field Level Media
Sports
Knicks and Nuggets Blow Big Leads: What Went Wrong in Game 2?
Roughly 5,000 feet of elevation separate Denver and New York City.
Still, gravity works the same regardless of where one stands. Just ask the NBA teams in both towns.
“You get too high, and you get, I don’t want to say cocky, but feeling yourself,” Nuggets guard Tim Hardaway Jr. said.
That sensation went south on either side of the country Monday night.
After squandering sizable leads that would have cemented commanding 2-0 advantages in their respective first-round playoff series, the Nuggets and Knicks now find themselves bracing for a fight.
Should their opponents ultimately have their number, Denver and New York will look back with disdain on 19 and 14. Those were the Game 2 cushions the teams coughed up as the No. 3 seeds in the Eastern and Western Conference.
“It’s a game we should’ve won,” Knicks guard Josh Hart said. “In the playoffs, we can’t give away games.”
Be that as it may, the Knicks did just that against the Atlanta Hawks. They controlled the outcome for much of the night and took a 12-point edge into the fourth quarter after leading by as many as 14.
Then New York shot 5-for-22 from the floor in the final 12 minutes compared to 10-for-15 for Atlanta. Fighting through vulgar chants from the Madison Square Garden faithful, Hawks star CJ McCullom scored six straight points down the stretch during one key sequence on the way to a game-high 32.
“In that fourth quarter, you could tell [the Hawks] were playing with a level of desperation,” Knicks coach Mike Brown said. “There were four 50-50 balls, and they got three of the four. We always use that stat to gauge the level of aggression in a game. In that fourth quarter, their aggression stepped up.”
New York’s melted at the same time. How many late possessions saw the Knicks pass or hold the ball around the perimeter before settling for subpar looks from 3-point range? The Knicks went 3-for-11 from deep as part of their flop.
Denver led the Minnesota Timberwolves by 19 points early in the second quarter before crumbling. The Nuggets still were ahead by three points to start the fourth quarter but a combined 2-for-12 shooting effort from pillars Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray in the final 12 minutes took a toll.
“I feel like we had the game in hand, and then we just didn’t make our shots,” Murray said.
As with the Knicks and Hawks, the reversal of fortunes stemmed both from the hosts’ miscues and an outstanding effort from a visiting player, as Minnesota’s Anthony Edwards had 30 points.
“Great leadership, positive,” Timberwolves coach Chris Finch said. “He recognized he needed to get into attack mode and get downhill a little bit more. He did that.”
The Knicks and Nuggets no doubt sensed the need to amp up their own urgency as things started slipping away Monday.
That neither could act upon it didn’t signal the end for either New York or Denver, of course. But now there’s unnecessary added weight for the climb back to the top.
Sports
Pistons seek return to identity vs. Magic after Game 1 shocker
Apr 19, 2026; Detroit, Michigan, USA; Detroit Pistons forward Tobias Harris (12) is defended by Orlando Magic guard Desmond Bane (3) in the second half during the 2026 NBA Playoffs at Little Caesars Arena. Mandatory Credit: Rick Osentoski-Imagn Images After an exceptional regular season, this wasn’t the start to the NBA playoffs that the Detroit Pistons envisioned.
Reeling from a stunning Game 1 loss in which only two players reached double figures, the Eastern Conference’s top seed heads into Game 2 Wednesday against the visiting Orlando Magic facing early pressure to reset the best-of-seven series.
The eighth-seeded Magic controlled the opener from the start, never trailing and leaning on a balanced offensive attack. Paolo Banchero led the way with 23 points while Franz Wagner scored 11 of his 19 in the fourth quarter to help close out the 112-101 win.
For Detroit, the issue wasn’t just the loss — it was how it happened. The Pistons never established their defensive identity and struggled to find consistent offense beyond star guard Cade Cunningham, two areas that will be central entering Game 2.
“It starts, always, with us defensively,” said Pistons coach J.B. Bickerstaff. “When you go back and watch the film of that (game), we weren’t ourselves defensively. The telling tale is typically when we play them, they go to the free-throw line a ton.
“… We went 38 (times) but they went 19. So that means we weren’t playing our brand of basketball, being physical, being handsy, being aggressive. That kind of sets the tone for us.”
Offensively, the Pistons leaned on Cunningham, who scored 39 points, but got little other support — scoring their fewest points in nearly three months, since a loss to the Phoenix Suns on Jan. 29. Detroit will need more help from All-Star center Jalen Duren, who was held to just eight points and seven rebounds in Game 1.
“They came out ready from the jump,” Duren said. “We didn’t really meet their intensity. They’ve been playing with their backs against the walls the last few weeks, so they were already kind of already rolling. I think we just got to do a better job meeting that intensity.”
Duren said the Pistons remain confident despite the loss, which extended their home playoff losing streak to 11 games, the longest in NBA history.
“We know the type of team we are,” Duren said. “We feel like we’re the better team. We know that we’ve just got to make adjustments and come out smarter, come out playing harder.”
Orlando coach Jamahl Mosley said he has talked to his team about not becoming too overconfident coming off Sunday’s win.
“It’s one game at a time,” Mosley said of his message to the team. “It’s the reality that, yeah, you did get the Game 1 win, but now you have to go and figure out how to get a Game 2 (win). There’s going to be, obviously, the positive talk about what you’ve done, and thinking there’s reasons to celebrate, but at the end of the day, it’s one game, and that’s the most important piece that we’ve talked about: just taking it one game at a time.”
Banchero said the team has received the message, and he believes the key for the Magic is to play defense like they did in the opener.
“I thought we were on a string, just communicating, talking out coverages,” Banchero said. “I think it’s just going to continue to take that, being aggressive, being the aggressors on defense and just not trying to give them much. Obviously they’re going to make shots, but just not trying to give them any free looks.”
–Field Level Media
Sports
Lynx star Napheesa Collier (ankle) targets June for on-court work
Mar 2, 2026; Brooklyn, NY, USA; Unrivaled Co-founder Napheesa Collier at Barclay’s Center. Mandatory Credit: Wendell Cruz-Imagn Images The Minnesota Lynx said Tuesday that star forward Napheesa Collier’s rehab from left ankle surgery is “progressing as expected,” and she could resume on-court activities in early June.
The team plans to release updates on Collier’s progress when available.
The timeline means Collier will miss, at minimum, the first month of the WNBA season, which begins May 10 for the Lynx.
Collier underwent surgery on her ankle on March 24 after sustaining a severe injury during the 2025 playoffs. Per reports at the time, she sustained a Grade 2 tear of three ligaments in the ankle and a muscle in her left shin on a collision during Game 3 of the playoff semifinal series vs. Phoenix.
Collier, 29, averaged a career-high 22.9 points and shot 40.3% from 3-point range to go with 7.3 rebounds, 3.2 assists, 1.6 steals and 1.5 blocks per game last year. The back-to-back WNBA Most Valuable Player runner-up, Collier is a five-time All-Star and earned MVP honors in the 2024 Commissioner’s Cup final and the 2025 All-Star Game.
–Field Level Media
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