Recap: Cleveland 119, Brooklyn 99 (or Brooklyn Garbage Scow)

MATT CAMPBELL/AFP/Getty Images

At 7-22, Brooklyn is a pretty lousy and has only three bigs worth discussion. Then they benched their starting power forward, Devin Booker, for rest, which gave the Nets zero inside presence. Cleveland took advantage of that by consistently getting to the rack and the boards, and despite pretty poor shooting from three (8-35) the wine and gold built a whopping 46 point lead in the late third quarter which relegated the last 15 minutes to garbage time.

Joshua Gunter, cleveland.com

Tristan Thompson feasted on the likes Brook Lopez, Justin Hamilton, and Louis Scola inside for 16 points and 11 (six offensive) rebounds in 26 minutes on 7-8 shooting. He was rim rockin and rollin and cleaning up the trash all night. Kevin Love cleaned on the glass on the defensive end: 15 rebounds (one offensive) in 25 minutes. Kev struggled shooting (4-14) after returning from a two game absence, but it was good to see him out there and active.

I think the team was very engaged on defense (or New Jersey was really bad), and LeBron chipped in three steals, and Kyrie pilfered a whopping six. DeAndre Liggins Did a great job of protecting the rim for a guard and has shown a knack for consistently breaking up plays around the basket. I love his ability to crash down from the wing.

Offensively, LeBron James drew most of the New Jersey defense, and Kyrie and Co. were able to operate in the open space. In fact, the Cleveland bench scored 25 in the first half, and the top four bench guys: Frye, Dunleavy, Jefferson, and Shumpert operated fantastically with various members of the big three. LeBron “only” scored 19 in 27 minutes with five rebounds and six assists (and a bunch more hockey assists) as he consistently got to the rim on drives and post-ups, oh, and he was +32. Including this freak nasty dunk off an inbound where he tried to rip the rim down on top of Joe Harris.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKJhXb3ibZo

But the best player this game was Uncle Drew. Kyrie Irving reached double digit assists for the third time in four games as he consistently gave up his own shot to set up his teammates. Kyrie scored 13, and dropped 10 dimes, grabbed five rebounds, on top of his six steals, and was a ridiculous +38 in 26 minutes, you know, just your run of the mill +1.5 per every minute he was in the game. He kicked it old school with Pistol Pete-esque plays like this.

Kyrie was slinging filthy passes too. Sports Illustrated‘s and Charles Barkley‘s rankings of 25th best in the NBA seems insane.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8VVHjYFx5Q

Even Mike Dunleavey looked like he’d been hooked up to the juvenation machine. Junior was working that diagonal cut from the left wing to the right block like he was in his twenties again. He scored 14, grabbed four boards, and even dropped a dime. His shot looked good too as he went 2-4 from the arc. I don’t need to tell you that a healthy and productive Mike Dunleavy would be a boon to this Cavalier squad trying to adjust to the prolonged absence of J.R. Smith.

The Nets were led Brook Lopez‘s 16 points. The Cavs were content to let him go one-on-one and score what he could score. Guards Jeremy Lin and Sean Kilpatrick combined for 22 and 10 dimes and and a combined -64 from the floor. Also notable, Gumdrop Bear! Our very own Anthony Bennett scored in double digits for the first time in almost two years (Jan 7, 2015) as he notched a very forgettable 11.

We had a tale of two Channing Fryes. He looked great with the mainline guys, 12 and six in 22 minutes, but the moment the game wasn’t in doubt he could have given two craps about defending the rim, which led to his -10 plus/minus. That’s not the attitude you want when you’re trying to develop young guys.

As well as the Cavs’ rotation played, the garbage time squad played like, well, hot garbage. Jordan McRae, James Jones, and Kay Felder all went -22, and made me wish Cleveland could trade the end of their bench for Nets’. Spencer Dinwiddie and Randy Foye kicked their butts, going +14 and +24 respectively. Dinwiddie looked especially good: 6-7 from the floor and he beat a path to the lane against the Cleveland scrubs.

And it’s not as if Kay didn’t score: he dropped 11 and his long range two-pointer looked effective. But as commenter JB225 said, ” He can’t run the offense and he looks like wants to play way more faster than he should.” Yeah, that about sums it up. McRae looked like the D-Leaguer he is. I’ve given up on expecting more.

That aside, Cleveland showed they can play nine deep, and tuned up well for their Christmas day game. Meanwhile, Golden State edged out the Pistons to make them winners of seven straight. It should be a fun Christmas. See you then.

P.S. Make sure you check out Friday’s “Dear Santa” article with gift ideas for the Cavs that you can use for your loved ones too. (Because we’re mostly guys and we do half our shopping at 4 PM on Christmas Eve).