There was a short moment on Tuesday night when the Cleveland Cavaliers and fans at Rocket Arena held their collective breaths.
A little over six minutes into their NBA preseason finale against the Detroit Pistons, training camp standout De'Andre Hunter stopped Detroit Pistons forward Tobias Harris on a fast break and poked the ball away from him as he tried to go left.
Hunter recorded a steal that got the Cavs out on the open floor, but didn't run with them after the fact.
Instead, he was slow to get up as former teammate Javonte Green was whistled for a kick ball while defending Cleveland's attack. Although Hunter gingerly walked up to join his teammates during that possession, the Cavs called a timeout and subbed in Donovan Mitchell.
“Bumped knees, no twist or anything like that,” Cavs head coach Kenny Atkinson said after the team's 118-100 win. “He got a pretty good hit, right, knee to knee.”
Hunter returned to the game at the 9:28 mark of the second quarter and played through the pain for about seven minutes before he was pulled. At halftime, the Cavs officially ruled him out with a right knee contusion.
“I just think it stiffened up,” Atkinson said. “There wasn't like a pain thing or you've got to go to the back. It was more like it stiffened up. That was kind of what I got from [Cavs head athletic trainer] Steve [Spiro], and we talked about it. I said, ‘There's no need to risk it.'”
“I'll be alright,” added De'Andre Hunter, who “for sure” will be ready for Cleveland's regular-season opener in New York on October 22.
Luckily for the wine-and-gold, Hunter appears to be just fine. He's had a phenomenal training camp and preseason, playing free and easy. Before leaving Tuesday's contest, Hunter had 14 points with a couple of threes and a 6-for-7 conversion rate at the free-throw line.
Hunter finishes the 2025 preseason averaging 17.0 points, 3.3 rebounds, 1.7 assists, and a steal in 18.7 minutes per game. He shot 59.3 percent from the field and made a scorching 70.0 percent of his three-point attempts.
