UPDATE 5:15 PM EST
Tyronn Lue announces that Kevin Love will return tonight in a starting role for the Cavs. He will have missed four weeks and two days following the arthroscopic knee surgery last month.
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Tonight, the Eastern Conference-leading Cleveland Cavaliers will square off against the Utah Jazz inside Quicken Loans Arena at 7:00 p.m. EST.
As most fans of the team know, the Cavs have been dealing with quite a few injuries this season, including Kevin Love’s knee, J.R. Smith’s fractured thumb, and a season-ending leg injury to Andrew Bogut just seconds into his debut.
Love’s injury has kept him out of the lineup since February 14th. The four-time NBA All-Star underwent surgery to remove a loose body mass from his knee and has missed 13 games. Subsequently, the Cavs are 7-and-6 without his services. The 6-foot-10 UCLA stand-out, who was averaging 20.0 points and 11.1 rebounds per game before his injury, was recently cleared to resume on-court agility and shooting drills, which would indicate that he is nearing a return.
Korver, who was acquired in a trade with the Atlanta Hawks in January, has been out of the Cavaliers’ lineup with foot soreness since March 9th. Before his injury, the smooth-shooting marksman was averaging 11.1 points (.487 from beyond the arc), 2.8 rebounds, and 1.8 assists per contest.
Both Korver and Love participated in Wednesday’s abbreviated practice session (roughly 20 minutes). While both players have a chance at playing tonight, it seems unlikely. Cavs Head Coach Tyronn Lue tells Joe Vardon of cleveland.com that he is trusting his medical staff.
“Whenever the training staff says they’re ready to go, we’re going to get them out there,” Lue said of Korver and Love returning.
When Love and Korver are able to return to action, Coach Lue and his coaching staff will have a few rotational decisions to make. Smith is easing his way back into a starting role after a fairly lengthy recovery, and Love is expected to resume his starting position at power forward.
“It’s been on my mind a lot lately as far as rotations, who’s going to play with who,” Lue said of the forthcoming lineup changes. “Of course when Kevin comes back he’s probably going to have a minutes restriction. Probably going to be tired. Probably going to be certain points of the game where you’ve got to take him out and you don’t want to. So there’s going to be some adjustment period, but we’ll get through it. But the biggest thing for me is just getting everybody back healthy so we can start taking off like we’re supposed to.”