Recap: Cavs 128, Celtics 122 (Or, taking LeBron for Granted)

The Cavs jumped all over the Celtics in the 1st half and scored enough to absorb a 71-point second half by the Celtics to improve to 5-0.  LeBron is far and away still the most important player (also the best player) in basketball, and nights like tonight only further reinforce that.  He finished with 30 points and 12 assists (just 2 turnovers) on only 22 shots.  The Cavs were at their peak when he wasn’t even trying to score.  James only had six in the first half when the Cavs scored 68 but his DNA was all over the team.  When the Cavs came out stagnant in the 2nd half, LeBron decided to drop 20 on his own in the 3rd quarter to keep the Celtics at bay.  The Cavs bled away a comfortable lead with LeBron sitting to start the 4th.  So he came back and in and made sure they didn’t lose.  He led all players in +/- with a +19.

1st Quarter:

Kyrie Irving flashed a variety of impressive shots and Tristan Thompson gobbled up 10 boards to go along with eight points and a vicious block on former teammate Tyler Zeller.

https://twitter.com/JPavlicevich33/status/794336190833053696

LeBron had 5 dimes and the Cavs finished the frame with zero turnovers.  It was clean, it was pretty, it was aggressive.  I thought the Celtics played well the entire quarter and still found themselves down double digits: 36-25. It’s no coincidence Kyrie always talks about Kobe.  He’s starting to shoot a lot of Kobe shots.  (but they’re going in so it’s ok!)

https://vine.co/v/5DgauYvTthn

2nd Quarter:

Kyrie and LeBron played the entire first so the subs got some run with Kevin Love to start the second frame.  The easy baskets dried up and the Celtics cut the lead to five before Kevin Love hit a 3 off a dish from Kyrie and then the Uncle Drew stuck back to back triples to push the lead back to 12.  A few possessions later, Tristan Thompson put his mark on the second quarter.

Awesome sequence for Tristan Thompson: dunks on Zeller; blocks a shot; scores on a putback. All in about 30 seconds. Cavs up 64-46

— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) November 4, 2016

https://twitter.com/CauldronICYMI/status/794347157138460672

Sheesh!  With one hand even!  The Cavs dropped 68 on the Celtics in the first half and they made it look easy.  68-51 at the break.

3rd Quarter:

The run and gun, free flowing, ball moving, transition attacking that was a staple of the 1st half really dried up out of the locker room.  Basically, LeBron just bailed out the Cavs with shot after shot.  Some of them were ridiculous, like this one:

https://vine.co/v/5DgtaeEuBAu

And one of the games’ other highlights came when LeBron outran three Celtics to flush an alley-oop off the glass from Kyrie.

Kyrie and LeBron playin' games.#CavsCeltics | #DefendTheLand https://t.co/kAHLX2QjDN

— Cleveland Cavaliers (@cavs) November 4, 2016

The Cavs held the Celtics to just two points in the last two minutes and nullified Boston’s 36 3rd quarter points with 36 of their own, 20 by King James.  Chalupas through 3: 100-83.

4th Quarter:

With LeBron resting, the Cavs managed just one bucket and two free throws from Kyrie in the first five minutes of the fourth quarter.  The Celtics cut what was once a 22 point lead down to five with 6:16 remaining on a Jaylen Brown 3.  Brown’s impressive performance invoked some high praise for Danny Ainge’s draft prowess.  Leading to this hilarious tweet:

"Danny Ainge has found another jewel"

sure pic.twitter.com/nj2edHa1mw

— max (@MaxOnTwitter) November 4, 2016

You know what happened next.  LeBron took over the game.  Very next possession he set up TT with this sweet dish.

https://vine.co/v/5DgVpMPAUYn

Minutes later with the Celtics down just five once again, he calmly stuck the 17-footer off the dribble when Marcus Smart chose to stay with TT, you know, to avoid the Vine above.

https://vine.co/v/5DgYOumtP2m

On the next possession, Amir Johnson settled for an out of rhythm 3 that LeBron corralled.  LeBron pushed the ball and even though everyone else was already in the half court, the Celtic defense wasn’t quite set and LeBron and Kevin Love stole a freebie.  Love just sprinted up the sideline and LeBron smartly gave up the ball early in the possession to let Kevin go to work on the run.  Amir Johnson had not yet picked up Love and Kevin drove right by him before the Celtics knew what hit them.

https://vine.co/v/5DgYH1YAJn1

Although the Celtics wouldn’t go quietly, the Cavs had gotten into the bonus very early in the quarter.  After his shot was partially blocked down low, LeBron grabbed the deflection and got fouled before calmly draining both free throws to push the lead back out to eight.  After Kevin Love earned two free throws the give a little more cushion, the crafty Isaiah Thomas drew contact to get back to the stripe.  Ty Lue called timeout with the Cavs up nine.  Thomas’ second free throw made it eight with two full minutes to play – plenty of time to make things interesting.  The Cavs ran this gorgeous play the next time down.

https://vine.co/v/5DXB3YnV2Zj

With Shumpert getting in Marcus Smart’s way and J.R. Smith drawing attention on the weak side, Kevin Love fed LeBron who threw a perfect pass as Kyrie shed the diminutive Isaiah Thomas and finished before any help could arrive.  That put the Cavs back up double digits.  That was enough.  Kevin Love delivered the final blow when he matched Marcus Smarts’ 3 with a corner 3 of his own.

Details You’ll Only Get from a Cavs:TheBlog Recap (probably)

-Marcus Smart hit a running baby hook to seal a win for the Celtics last night.  He must have empowered because tonight he hit a 16′ running hook against the Cavs.

-Reggie Miller declared the Kardashian curse broken after TT’s poster on Tyler Zeller.

-Terry Rozier, a rookie point guard out of Louisville, had a nice game with 7 points, 2 rebounds, and 2 assists in 16 minutes.  He’s from Youngstown.

-The Cavs had 16 assists in the first half and just eight in the second half.  Consequently, they were 11-18 from downtown in the first half and just 3-16 in the second half.

-Channing Frye had another outstanding game, but only got 15 minutes of burn.  He hit all three of his 3-point attempts and finished +11 in 15 minutes.  He looked rather mobile at both ends.

-Even though they struggled from the field, Kevin Love and Iman Shumpert earned 21 free throws and cashed in on 19 of them.  That really helped the Cavs keep pace with the Celtics in the second half.

Final Thoughts:

I was just so impressed with LeBron tonight.  He did everything at an elite level.  He was Magic James in the first half, Kobe James in the 3rd quarter, and Oscar James in the 4th quarter.  He had his handle going and was able to get anywhere he wanted in the 1st half.  He used this to back down inferior defenders and find wide open shots for teammates.  He pushed the pace and got the other Cavaliers playing with confidence.  When things got more difficult in the 3rd quarter, he bailed the Cavs out with so many shots, some of them uncharacteristic.  Then, after the Cavs squandered a once 22-point lead, he checked in, put his fingerprints on almost every possession, and secured the victory.  It was a virtuoso performance.

Kyrie Irving and Tristan Thompson really had it going in the 1st half.  Kyrie is going to have multiple 50+ point outings this season.

It’s hard for me to criticize the defense because I don’t know how much of their lapses were effort based.  I thought they really hustled in the 1st quarter and the Celtics just executed their way to 25 points.  But I think the huge halftime lead made them complacent and they kind of went through the motions defensively after the half.  The Celtics spread out their attack, and with Bradley, Smart, and now this rookie Jayden Brown draining multiple 3-pointers the Cavs had to respect the deep ball.  The Celtics run a million screens and cuts at the top of the key to get their ball handlers running downhill into the teeth.  I thought the Cavs stayed home a bit too much and should have been more aggressive in sending help defenders at Avery Bradley especially.  Thomas is super crafty around the hoop – so you tip your cap to the game he had (30 points and 6 dimes).  He drew 14 foul shots and I noticed a handful of times he went out of his way to NOT draw fouls when he had, as A.C. would say “a bird!”.  As quick as he is, it’s really his motor that impresses me.  It just seems like he never takes a play off.

I’m going to predict that sometime between Christmas and the All-Star game the Cavs are going to either make a move for a legitimate playmaking point guard or are going to stagger their lineups a bit.  In that event there will be less Kyrie and LeBron together.  It’s not that they were getting in each other’s way or that they weren’t making life easier on the other at times, it’s just that some of the guys on the team absolutely need LeBron’s court vision, passing, and leadership to be impactful.  Guys like Richard Jefferson, Mike Dunleavy Jr., Channing Frye, and Tristan Thompson especially.  Kyrie doesn’t really need LeBron as badly to be impactful.  The jury is still out for me on Kevin Love.  I know the team plays better with LeBron on the court, but I’m not sure if it’s enough of a bonus to keep Kevin from anchoring the low post with the second unit. (This is what the Cavs are doing right now with Love, btw) LeBron really shouldn’t be playing more than 36 minutes a night and the Cavs can’t just bleed points for a quarter of every game.

That’s why all those Delly Oops too TT were so fantastic – it was like a super effective, Non-LeBron-based weapon.  It’s why Kyrie’s explosion against Portland two seasons ago was such an iconic win – the Cavs actually beat a good team when LeBron didn’t suit up.  The Cavs are going to need to figure out what the non-LeBron-Based weapon (NLBW) is with this roster.  Tonight I saw on a number of occasions sequences where Kevin Love came to set screens for Kyrie and Kyrie dribbled to the opposite side of the screen and then dribbled back towards Love.  We don’t need to rehash it and I’m not trying to complain about Kyrie.  But this post from David Wood still rings true.  It still rang true during the Championship run.  The Cavs need to find ways to get easy baskets when LeBron is resting, because they just don’t have the personnel to be a lock down defensive team when LeBron isn’t on the court wreaking havoc.  Maybe it will just be Kyrie getting buckets, but again, that’s going to require staggering LeBron and Kyrie more than Tyronn Lue is probably comfortable with.  We’ll be keeping an eye on this at CtB.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZx-v6asfa0