Donovan Mitchell has been here before. From 2017 to 2022, the Utah Jazz won about 60% of their regular-season games just about every year but never advanced past the second round of the playoffs. In 2020-21, they finished the regular season with the best record in the NBA and by far the best net rating, then caught a break when the Los Angeles Clippers ' Kawhi Leonard tore his ACL in Game 4 of their second-round series. The Jazz lost the next two games in dispiriting fashion, with Clippers wing Terance Mann raining making wide-open 3 after wide-open 3 after wide-open 3 after wide-open 3 in the clincher.

The 2024-25 Cleveland Cavaliers may have been superior to all of those Jazz teams. They had a better record (64-18) and a slightly better net rating (+9.2) than the one that l

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