Live Thread: Cavs @ Thunder
2014-12-11
This is always one of my favorite match-ups of the year. I’ve Aunts and Uncles and cousins in Wichita and OKC, and they pull big-time for KD and the gang. It’s fun to send some trash talk across the great plains. The Tacoma City Plunder, as I call them, come into the game finally healthy and winners of five of the last six, now that reigning MVP, Kevin Durant has returned along with All-Star, Russell Westbrook. KD hasn’t lost much in his four games back, with shooting splits of .492/.316/.889 to go along with 22 points, 5.5 rebounds, and four assists in 29 minutes a night. Westbrook has been similarly stellar, posting a 31.5 PER so far this year, and adding 24.5 points, seven dimes, and six rebounds in 28 minutes a night with splits of .433/.306/.814. Contrast that with LeBron and Kyrie… The head-to-head position battles tonight will be epic.
James Vs. Durant, Irving Vs. Westbrook, Marion Vs. Roberson?, Varejao Vs. Adams… One can’t ever forget block machine, Serge Ibaka when talking of the Thunder. Kevin Love will have his hands full. Jeremy Lamb has also emerged as a solid bench scorer for the Zombie Sonics, averaging 12 points off the bench with a 58.5 TS%. A lanky 6’5″, Jeremy will be a tough match-up for the Cavs bench guys. Add Anthony Morrow, Reggie Jackson, Perry Jones, and all-time-tough-guy, Kendrick Perkins, and this Thunder bench is intimidating. Cleveland is going to need big contributions from everyone.
Oklahoma City is still on the outside of the Western Playoff race, looking in. At 8-13 they’re three games back of eighth place Phoenix and 11 games back of the NBA best Warriors. So every game is huge for them right now. The Cavs, meanwhile, are waiting on a “Game Time Decision” to determine if LeBron James plays tonight. Fortunately, the Cavs have shown they can win without him, taking three of the the last five contests from OKC during the LeBronless years, including one of the biggest Cavs victories last season, a stunning 114-102 February victory in OKC. Given the burgeoning rivalry, I’d be shocked and concerned if the King missed a showdown this big.
Update: LeBron will sit out this game with “general knee soreness.” Matthew Dellavedova will start in his place.
Well at least we fought back after those awful second and third quarters. We were getting pretty decent looks we just could not get our shots to fall. I’m proud of this team for fighting back and making it a game in the fourth quarter. I kind of had a bad feeling when I saw they took away a point from Delly. At that point three down was manageable but I didn’t feel good about a four point deficit, a two possession game, which quickly turned into six points down and that was pretty much that. I really don’t understand… Read more »
Agree with you on all counts. Blatt has a great roster and he is still struggling to figure out line-ups mid December. Excuse time is over. Everyone shot horribly with the exception of Delly and Tristan. Harris’s 0 pts, 0 steals 0 rebounds 0 assists did nothing to help this team but yet he rewarded play time in Clutch Time of all places. Cavs are a playoff contender team; coach like it !
Joe Harris did manage to foul Durant to seal the game.
I agree I don’t understand why Dion was on the bench, he was playing fine
I thought that, for every basket Dion made, he messed up on two or three others. Just my opinion. His positive plays are very impressive, though.
When he walked off the floor late in the game he seemed to avoid Blatt, who called him over, and his body language wasn’t all that great.
@ChrisBHaynes: Matthew Dellavedova was the only member of the #Cavs to shoot 50 percent or higher. The team shot 37 percent as a whole against the Thunder.
COrrection: So did Tristan Thompson. He was 4-8 fg% Everyone else BOOOOO
Cavs showed grit considering lebron was out. Seemed as if Andy was tentative around the basket. Was a great game to see. Pleased with delly and think he is getting into a groove with the other scorers
They lost tonight because irving and live were merely good when they had to be great.
Agree with that sentiment. I thought both KI and KLove needed to be in the 25 point range to get this win. They played some good D though and kept the Thunder from blowing them out of the building.
They weren’t good tonight.
Dion wasn’t much better with 5-13.
Kyrie is 7 for 21 tonight.
Knee was an issue I’m sure, but not the only issue. He forced some shots tonight and his jumper hasn’t been falling as much of late.
Now they really should take Kyrie out though
Tough one. OKC is too good to give this away now.
So much for this team being flawed
The ability to defend at the basket and finish at the basket were huge problems. Nice troll though.
Play nice, children.
Hard to win when you shoot just 37% from the field. But you’ve got to admire the gutty effort in the second half. They didn’t curl up and die. They fought back. Proud of this team.
Great effort by the cavs. With leb we win this easily.
Without Delly this is a blowout.
Delly was shutting down Durant tonight.
Kyrie and KLove need to be looking to score here!
They made a nice comeback but I think it’s too much of a deficit at this point. I think Delly had the best game tonight. No denying.
If they lose, it won’t be because they didn’t give maximum effort to come back. OKC looked like they thought they had it won when they were up by 17.
Irving. Ugh. And Jeez Love is a wuss.
Bad turnover by Kyrie there
Damn, they took a point away from Delly
LET’S GO CAVS!! LET’S GO CAVS!!! LET’S GO CAVS!!!
3 POINT GAME!!!!!! Let’s go Cavs!!!!!!!!
NOT GIVING UP! (Your comment is too short. Please go back and try again.) Okay, long enough now?
This is a game now!
What a team griffin has put together! Hanging at okc without leb and miller
Was worried we’d lost you there Cols! Keep the faith man!
KYRIEEE!!!! Terrific move and score
Delly with fierce defense.
Delly has actually played well
I just took a screen shot of this post ;)
Delly is FREAKING GUARDING DURANT NOW!!
Great feed from Delly there
Nice pass by delly
Still a winnable game. Cavs need stops and smart ball handling
They’ve gotten good shots tonight. Just missed too many.
Agreed. There were a lot of good looks in the first quarter and a half and we missed a lot. Shots go tougher as the game progressed.
Need some irving magic
I really hope we don’t play okc in the finals. They are tough.
Love looks tired on his shot right now.