Recap: Cleveland 108, New York 87 (or, Dunking on the Knicks)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wq6BqoxdoeU

Cleveland is beating the teams they’re supposed to, and they’re so young they might currently be immune to the New York night life. It was the Knicks who looked hung over in this one, as they never led and trailed by as much as 30 to the Cavs. While New York made an obligatory run in the late third and early fourth, they never got closer than 12 or 13, and were mainly aided by the Cavs freezing out Kevin Love for inextricably long stretches. When the good guys did go back to Love and Thompson, good things happened and Cleveland won going away.

The loss produced several moments of sustained booing by Knickerbocker faithful, and was so bad that that president Steve Mills and GM Scott Perry left during the game for a private meeting with James Dolan. Dolan, the lead singer of a Blues band, Straight Shot, that is objectively worse than his team, forced his toadies to hold an impromptu press conference after the game. “Dolan returned to his seat near the beginning of the fourth quarter but both Mills and Perry were out of sight for the entire second half,” New York Daily News writer Stefan Bondy reported. It’s never not fun to see the Knicks panicking.

It begs so many questions. Did the Knicks just not take the Cavs seriously? Is the Big Apple’s night life undefeated for their collection of 20-something rich power forwards? Is New York’s roster just fatally flawed? (Yes). After all, this is a team that traveled to Dallas Friday and beat the Mavs in their building. David Fizdale’s team keeps getting blown out at home though. Regardless, there are few fans with less hubris than Spike Lee and Co., and dunking on them is part of life’s rich pageant.

I don’t care if the Knicks started a 19-year-old combo forward at guard next to Frank Ntilikina whose name roughly translated means “French Gum Drop.” It’s legitimately fun to watch the Cavs come in, be the professional team, and take care of business. Collin Sexton had flame shooting out of his nostrils as he should have against a squad of slow footed forward tweeners. Sexton was super aggressive on D to start the game and blew up several half hearted Knick picks to force a couple turnovers, including one where he ripped the ball away from Barrett and raced down the court for a soft slam. Youngbull dropped 31 on 16 shots, but what impressed me were the kinds of shots he was taking: catch-and-shoot rainbow threes from the corner, knock down threes from above the break, and easy buckets out of the break. He often took an outlet from Kevin Love,  scored, got fouled, or found a teammate.

In his best sequence of the game, Sexton accelerated down the baseline to contest a three pointer, hit another gear to fly up the left sideline, took a Kevin Love laser in stride, and instead of going-one-on-two, found Cedi Osman on the right wing, trailing for a triple. It was, as Eleanor Roosevelt opined, “Hot, nasty, badass speed” (queued up below).

Sexton has been a one dimensional player at times for the Cavs, a scorer who does nothing else, but he was fiery on defense with even an un-credited block and engaged. He legit was making RJ Barrett wary of putting the ball on the floor at times. The second best play of the night came when Collin was sitting on a career high 29, and instead of gunning for 30, set up a pretty oop for Tristan Thompson.

Darius Garland had a nice gane too, with a few tricky passes, and a night of thankfully not shooting too much as he got to the line and went 6-6 to finish with 12 points and six dimes. Cedi had an off night shooting with just one make in six triple tries, but he added five dimes and just one turnover.

The Cavs’ big man duo combined for 26 points and 17 rebounds. Kev was a little off from the field but made up for it with a perfect 9-9 from the line. One of Cleveland’s few sins was camping him on the weakside and not letting him touch the ball for minutes on end in the late third to let New York make a big run to cut the lead down from 30.

Thankfully, TT took matters into his own hands on a couple plays where he went point center early in the fourth and fed Kev in the post. While Thompson scored just nine, he earned every bit of his game high +33. I’m sure he was thinking about the big contracts that the scrubs he was dominating signed in the offseason while he schooled them.

Larry Nance Jr. was also solid with nine and nine. Don’t tell anyone but he’s quietly shooting 39% from three so far this season. While I hate him being so far from the middle of the paint, the stretch big experiment is paying off.

CLARKSON YAM DOT GIF #BeTheFight pic.twitter.com/rAfX3cGqaK

— Cleveland Cavaliers (@cavs) November 11, 2019

The warts this game came from Jordan Clarkson who leveraged a big dunk early into a license to fire away from everywhere else no matter the situation, and shoot 1-6 on Js and 5-8 at the rim to finish with 17/3/1 with three turnovers (it was a hell of a dunk, though). Kevin Porter Junior was similarly efficient inside with quick twitch drives, beautiful footwork, and an ability to hang and finish at filthy angles. He also came from off-screen to throw down a putback dunk over a hapless Kevin Knox. He then went 0-3 from outside. Still, KPJ had his moments.

As CLF noted in the Live Thread, the Cavs need to stop running plays that leads to shots for Delly. He flubbed two flobs and got blocked on a three. He can still rebound, pass, and set screens with the best of them, though, and he ran the best fast break of the season with Larry Nance Jr. filling up the left lane for an easy thumper.

For the Knicks, someone had to score, and that someone was Julius Randle who dropped 20 and 16 and got Thompson into a bit of foul trouble. Fortunately, Marcus Morris was a putrid 3-12 and a game low -28 to complement him. Additionally, Kevin Knox and Frank Ntilikina stink and RJ Barrett is meh. After the game, many jokes flew, the Cavs celebrated, and New York sighed.

The Cavs embarrassed the Knicks so badly tonight that the Knicks’ GM and president had to come out and address the media. Ten games into the season. That’s sumthin’

— Jason Lloyd (@ByJasonLloyd) November 11, 2019

Perry couldn't be reached for comment because he was frantically working the phones to engineer a trade for Chris Paul. https://t.co/dj4Gc1BvUT

— HoopsDogg (@oldseaminer) November 11, 2019