Cleveland Cavs 115 — OKC Thunder 92
Lebron James and his Cleveland Cavs basically played on the road today without Kyrie Irving, Iman Shumpert, and Mo Williams, but still easily beat the Thunder by a score of 115-92 inside Chesapeake Energy Arena. It would not be a reach to say Oklahoma City was outclassed from start to finish.
Cleveland led 62-53 at the half, then 95-73 after three periods. If this were a prizefight a white towel would have seemed appropriate. LeBron, Kevin Love, JR Smith and Co. were better than anything the Thunder could answer.
This defeat goes down as the fourth worst home defeat (23 points) since Clay Bennett moved the Sonics to Oklahoma City just prior to the inaugural 2008 season.
In my eyes, the previous worst Thunder home defeat came in that 2008 season when OKC was blown out by New Orleans in the game which got PJ Carlesimo fired and Scott Brooks elevated to interim head coach. But keep in mind, Durant, Westbrook, Green, and Ibaka were still youngsters just discovering their way during a 23-59 season.
Today was worse because Durant, Westbrook, and Ibaka were all healthy and rested. No excuses. Oklahoma City was simply outclassed because they can’t defend at an elite level and their journey to find a dependable shooting guard remains an unsolved puzzle.
Dion Waiters will go down as the scapegoat and he was in fact horrific, but keep in mind Waiters, Morrow, and Randy Foye went a combined 4-21.
Add to the fact, Kyle Singler didn’t score a point while Enes Kanter was literally abused by Timothy Mosgov.
I’m sure this won’t lead Nick Gallo’s storyline, but basically all four players Sam Presti acquired by trade either last season or this season were all bad today versus the Cavs.
Durant, Westbrook, Adams, and even rookie Cam Payne played okay, but there wasn’t enough from the rest of the team to beat a Cleveland club which was missing two of its top six players on the road.
You can sugarcoat it, you can blame it on Dion Waiters, you can blame it on multiple things, but what OKC showed today was they’re much closer to pretender status versus being regarded as a serious contender.
Mike Jackson