The Portland Trail Blazers came up just short in a gutsy effort against the NBA’s best team last night... and though the Cleveland Cavaliers were missing their best player in Donovan Mitchell, the Cavs were 3-0 without him this year heading into the game and the Blazers were missing a handful of starters and rotation players of their own.
Coming back down off an overtime high is tough; it’s even tougher when you’re traveling 400+ miles from Cleveland to Philly to play the second night of a back-to-back after three Blazers (Deni Avdija, Anfernee Simons, and Toumani Camara) played 42 or more minutes, and another (Shaedon Sharpe) played 39.