James Harden scored 36, Evan Mobley added 26 points and 14 rebounds and Cleveland hung on to beat the Chicago Bulls 115-110 even though Cavaliers star Donovan Mitchell missed the game because of a bruised left eye. Harden nailed seven 3-pointers. Jaylon Tyson chipped in with 18 points and 11 rebounds, and the Cavaliers hung on after a 29-point lead in the third quarter dwindled to one in the game’s closing minutes. Mitchell was hurt in a collision in practice with Mobley. Tre Jones scored 20 for Chicago.

Cleveland star Donovan Mitchell missed the Cavaliers’ game Thursday night against the Chicago Bulls because of a bruised left eye. Mitchell was hurt in a collision in practice with Evan Mobley. The seven-time All-Star played through the injury in Cleveland’s victory at Milwaukee on Tuesday night and finished with 19 points on 4-for-14 shooting. He said after the game that he was having trouble seeing. Coach Kenny Atkinson said the injury is “nothing serious,” but the Cavaliers need to “let it clear up.” Mitchell is eighth in the NBA in scoring at 28 points per game while shooting a career-high 47.9%. He’s averaging 5.9 assists, 4.5 rebounds and 1.6 steals.

All-Star guard Cade Cunningham of the Eastern Conference-leading Detroit Pistons has a collapsed lung and is expected to miss at least two weeks and possibly more. The team announced the diagnosis Thursday. The Pistons listed Cunningham as out for Thursday’s game in Washington with a left back contusion. Cunningham got hurt in Tuesday’s win over Washington, leaving midway through the opening quarter with what the team called back spasms. Cunningham is averaging 24.5 points and 9.9 assists for the Pistons. Detroit entered Thursday 3 1/2 games ahead of Boston for the top spot in the East with 14 games remaining.

Deni Avdija scored 23 of his 32 points in the first half and Donovan Clingan added a career-high 28 points and grabbed 13 rebounds to help the Portland Trail Blazers hold off the hard-charging Indiana Pacers 127-119. Portland won the for the third time in four games and inched closer to a Western Conference play-in spot. Avdija also had 11 rebounds on a night Portland had 79 first-half points to match its highest-scoring half this season. Ivica Zubac led the injury-riddled Pacers with 18 points. Indiana extended the longest losing streak in the franchise's NBA history to 15 games.

Giannis Antetokounmpo wasn’t available for the Milwaukee Bucks’ 123-116 loss to Cleveland Cavaliers on Tuesday night after leaving a victory over Indiana two days earlier. The Bucks say the two-time MVP has a hyperextended left knee and a bone bruise. Antetokounmpo didn’t play in the fourth quarter of Sunday’s 134-123 win over the Pacers after landing awkwardly when he dunked late in the third period. Antetokounmpo downplayed the injury after the game. He has missed 32 games this season, by far the most in his 13-year career.

Evan Mobley had 27 points and a season-high 15 rebounds, and James Harden also scored 27 as the Cleveland Cavaliers opened a three-game trip by beating the short-handed Milwaukee Bucks 123-116. Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo sat out with a left knee hyperextension and bone bruise. This was the career-high 32nd game the two-time MVP has missed this season, and the Bucks fell to 11-21 without him. Kevin Porter Jr. had 25 points and 10 assists for the Bucks. Cleveland pulled ahead for good 103-100 on Sam Merrill’s 3-pointer with 6:55 remaining, which started an 8-0 run.

Josh Hart scored a season-high 33 points on 12-of-13 shooting including 5 of 5 from 3-point range to lead the New York Knicks over the Indiana Pacers 136-110. OG Anunoby scored 26 points and Karl Anthony Towns added 22 points and 11 rebounds in the Knicks’s fourth straight win. Jarace Walker led the Pacers with 16 points as Indiana’s losing streak reached 14 games. Indiana was  within 99-89 in the third quarter but the Knicks increase their lead to 27 points, 134-107, on Kevin McCullar Jr.’s basket with 1:58 remaining.

The March Madness spotlight is set to lock on a long list of high-end freshman NBA prospects. This season's potential draft class is considered to be the deepest in years. That group has now reached the NCAA Tournament with a chance to take center stage. The top freshman prospects are BYU's AJ Dybantsa, Duke's Cameron Boozer and Kansas' Darryn Peterson. Others to watch include Arkansas' Darius Acuff Jr., Houston's Kingston Flemings and Arizona's Brayden Burries.

The NBA may move a step closer to adding teams in Seattle and Las Vegas next week when expansion will be again discussed by the league’s board of governors, two people with knowledge of the matter tell The Associated Press. It is expected that a vote on whether to go forward with those two cities as the sole targets for expansion at this time takes place next week as well, the people said. The people spoke on condition of anonymity because those were not released publicly. It would take a three-fourths majority of governors to go forward.

Cleveland forward Max Strus had 24 points in his season debut as the Cavaliers lost to the Dallas Mavericks. The 6-foot-5 forward suffered a Jones fracture — a break of the bone that connects the little toe to the base of the foot — during offseason training and underwent surgery on Aug. 26. When Strus had the surgery, it was expected he would resume basketball activities in three to four months. Strus scored 16 points in the first half. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, he is the first player since 1997-98 to score at least 15 points in the first half of a season debut after not playing in at least the first 60 games of the season.