4 Reasons Why the Cavs Reign Supreme in the NBA Standings

Surprisingly, the Cleveland Cavaliers have achieved the league's best record of 23-4, with 33% of the season already completed.

Everybody in the Cavs’ rotation was on the roster last season, but Cleveland is the league’s second-most improved team, both in regard to winning percentage and point differential per 100 possessions. The only team that’s seen bigger jumps is one – the Memphis Grizzlies – that’s been much healthier.

Biggest jump, point differential per 100 possessions

Team

2023-24

Rank

2024-25

Rank

Diff.

Memphis

-6.9

26

+9.2

4

16.1

Cleveland

+2.5

12

+10.3

2

7.8

Detroit

-9.0

29

-3.3

22

5.7

Houston

+0.9

18

+6.6

6

5.7

Oklahoma City

+7.3

2

+11.9

1

4.6

Through Dec. 19, 2024

Here are some notes, numbers and film on how the Cavs have gotten off to such a strong start.

1. It’s all about the offense, and mostly about shooting

The Cavs have allowed 1.8 fewer points per 100 possessions than they did last season, but that’s a little less than the league-average drop (2.0 per 100).

Their improvement has been almost entirely about an offense that has scored 120.6 points per 100 possessions, the league’s highest rate and 5.9 per 100 more than the Cavs scored last season.

The Cavs have seen the league’s second-biggest drop in turnover rate, averaging 0.7 fewer turnovers per 100 possessions when the league (as a whole) is averaging 1.2 more than it did last season. Fewer turnovers give them more opportunities to shoot, and shooting is what the Cavs have done best.

Shooting is the most important aspect of any offense and Cleveland has an effective field goal percentage of 59.2%, the highest mark in NBA history.

Highest effective field goal percentage, NBA history

Team

Season

FGM

FGA

FG%

3PM

3PA

3P%

eFG%

Cleveland

2024-25

1,203

2,388

50.4%

420

1,052

39.9%

59.2%

New York

2024-25

1,167

2,346

49.7%

388

980

39.6%

58.0%

Indiana

2023-24

3,855

7,599

50.7%

1,082

2,891

37.4%

57.8%

Boston

2023-24

3,601

7,396

48.7%

1,351

3,482

38.8%

57.8%

Brooklyn

2020-21

3,106

6,289

49.4%

1,020

2,600

39.2%

57.5%

eFG% = FGM + (0.5 * 3PM)) / FGA

The Cavs rank third in Second Spectrum’s shot-quality metric, up from fifth last season. They’ve seen small jumps in both the percentage of their shots that have come in the restricted area and the percentage that have come from 3-point range.

They’ve seen a bigger jump in how much they’ve out-shot their expected effective field goal percentage. In other words, they’re taking slightly better shots and shooting much better on the shots they’ve taken.

The Cavs have seen the league’s second-biggest jump in field goal percentage in the paint and its biggest jump in 3-point percentage.

There are 28 players who attempted at least 200 shots last season and at least 100 this season that have seen a jump in effective field goal percentage of at least 5.5 percentage points. Four of those 28 are Cavs…

Cavs’ most improved shooters

2023-24

2024-25

Diff.

Player

FGA

eFG%

FGA

eFG%

eFG%

Rank

Caris LeVert

820

48.7%

168

64.6%

15.9%

3

Jarrett Allen

819

63.4%

213

69.5%

6.1%

23

Isaac Okoro

480

57.7%

107

63.6%

5.8%

26

Darius Garland

841

52.4%

388

58.0%

5.6%

28

Rank = Among 221 players with at least 200 FGA in 2023-24 and at least 100 FGA in ’24-25

All four of those guys are registering the highest effective field goal percentages of their careers, with Caris LeVert’s mark of 64.6% being his highest mark by a huge margin. His previous high was 52.8% as a rookie eight seasons ago.

2. Subtle changes

There haven’t been major changes to the Cavs’ offense, but there have been tweaks.

They’ve seen a small jump in the percentage of their possessions that have been in transition, according to Synergy tracking. Relatedly, the Cavs rank fourth with 18.4 pass-ahead passes per game, according to Second Spectrum. That’s up from 14.8 (eighth) last season.They’ve seen the league’s biggest jump player movement, averaging 11.6 miles traveled per 24 minutes of possession (ninth), up from 10.3 (29th) last season.They’re driving more, 54.2 times per 100 possessions (fourth), up from 40.5 (14th) last seasonBoth Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell have seen significant drops in how much time they have possession of the ball, while Evan Mobley has seen a jump, from 1.9 minutes per game (6.2% of his time on the floor) to 2.3 minutes per game (7.6%).The guy who’s taken the ball out of the two starting guards’ hands the most is Ty Jerome, who played just 15 total minutes last season and has averaged 18 minutes (2.5 minutes of possession) this season.

Better balance in regard to who’s handling the ball, added ball and player movement, and more drives allow Garland and Mitchell to attack a rotating defense more often…

3. Mitchell-Mobley minutes have been dominant

The Cavs have two great playmaking guards and two great rim-protecting bigs. That allows them to have one of each on the floor at all times. This season, they’ve paired Garland with Jarrett Allen, with Mitchell playing more minutes alongside Mobley.

(It was the opposite last season, probably because Garland and Mobley got hurt at the same time and the Cavs went on a big run with only Mitchell and Allen in the lineup.)

The Cavs have outscored their opponents with only Garland and Allen on the floor, but they’ve been at their best (plus-15.3 points per 100 possessions) with only Mitchell and Mobley.

Cavs’ efficiency, 2024-25

On floor

MIN

OffRtg

DefRtg

NetRtg

+/-

Garland, Mitchell, Mobley & Allen

318

118.8

111.0

+7.8

+47

3 of the 4

164

122.4

107.7

+14.7

+65

Only Garland, Allen

278

124.5

122.4

+2.1

+22

Only Mitchell, Mobley

274

112.0

96.7

+15.3

+80

OffRtg = Points scored per 100 possessions
DefRtg = Points allowed per 100 possessions
NetRtg = Point differential per 100 possessions

This goes back, in part, to how well Jerome and LeVert have shot. But the success of the Mitchell-Mobley minutes has been more about defense.

4. Defense still getting it done

Overall, the Cavs still have a top-10 defense for what would be the fourth straight season. And while the improvement from last season has come on offense, the other end of the floor still matters a lot.

Cleveland is one of five teams that rank in the top 10 in both opponent field goal percentage in the paint (54.7%, sixth) and the percentage of their opponents’ shots that have come in the paint (47%, ninth lowest).

The defense is different from last season in regard to forcing turnovers. The Cavs rank fifth in opponent turnover rate (15.8 per 100 possessions), up from 13th (13.8) last season. And more turnovers lead to more transition opportunities on the other end of the floor.

Jerome’s presence has been a factor there. His 4.8 deflections per 36 minutes rank ninth among 276 players who’ve played at least 300 minutes.

The big question for the Cavs going forward is how sustainable the shooting will be. We keep waiting for LeVert to cool off, but he’s 13-for-21 from 3-point range over the last five games.

The Cavs have played a lot more games against teams that currently rank in the bottom 10 defensively (12) than against teams that currently rank in the top 10 (5), with only one of their 27 games having come against a top-five defense.

They won’t face another top-five defense until Jan. 8, but they’ll have a big test when they host the Bucks on Friday (7:30 ET, NBA TV).

* * *

John Schuhmann is a senior stats analyst for NBA.com. You can e-mail him here, find his archive here and follow him on X.

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