On Monday December 23rd at 7pm eastern time, the 25-4 Cleveland Cavaliers hosted the 7-20 Utah Jazz at the Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse in downtown Cleveland Ohio. The Cavaliers last game was another 126-99 dominate win over the Philadelphia 76ers at home last Saturday. The Jazz’s previous game was a 105-94 win on the road over the Brooklyn Nets on Saturday as well. Out for the Cavaliers were Isaac Okoro and Emoni Bates. For the Jazz Taylor Hendricks, Oscar Tshiebwe, and David Jones Garcia were listed as out for the game. The Cavaliers were going for their 26th win of the season and to add to their 2.5 game lead as the eastern conference top seed over the Boston Celtics.

The game had a delayed start of 40 minutes due to a needed basketball hoop repair. It was an evenly matched game at the start and the Cavaliers led the Jazz after 1 quarter of play 29-27. The game stayed close in the second quarter and the Cavaliers led the Jazz at halftime 60-56. The Cavaliers pulled away from the Jazz in the third quarter and led after 3 quarters of play 99-88. The Jazz made a fourth quarter run and came to within a point of the Cavaliers. But the Cavaliers made a late fourth quarter run of their own and pull out the 124-113 win.

The leading scorers for the Cavaliers were Darius Garland and Sam Merrill each with 23 points. Evan Mobley had another double-double with 19 points and 11 rebounds in 34 minutes of play. The Cavaliers had five players score double digits in points.  Up next of the 26-4 Cavaliers is the beginning of a four-game west coast trip in Denver Colorado on Friday December 27th at 9 pm eastern time, to play the Denver Nuggets. From there they will travel to California to take on the Lakers and Warriors. The last game of the trip will be in Dallas Texas to face the Mavericks. This trip will be a big test for this team. We will have to see inf they pass or fail the test.