YES! We WON(again!)! What a rush !
First of all, have got to give credit to steven adams. I think he is my favourite center in the game. He is so strong its unbelievable, at one point lebron james was fully committed to boxing him out and he still pushed him away. He is a big problem for the cavs, can you imagine if we kept him to his regular 13-9? It would have been another spanking. There were a few times where we didn't box him out at all which is horrible of course. But there were 3 guys standing right next to him, trying to get the rebound but not boxing him out. Ofcourse you will lose that battle. I think if we see them again we should have 2 guys fully committed to boxing him out. Its not like the other guys are trying to get boards as much as this guy is.
George Hill:
Amazing again, Westbrook was less aggressive when being picked up by hill is what i saw a couple of times. Made all the right plays again, picked up people full court and even inspired JR to follow him and do the same. He sets the tone for others and he might be our silent leader behind lebron.
Cedi:
Again bringing the intensity the joy and the defensive effort, pushing the ball when he can. I think people are not giving him enough credit for his offense though. He was aggressive on the offensive end and he should continue to do so. I think he can become a good offensive player, you can see the potential is there, because he does it all. He drives, shoots 3's and shoots off the dribble and off cuts. To me he is a very all-round player but just not very polished yet.
Lebron James:
The king! Was great again, third quarter was crazy! But he did force it too much, when he finally missed that 3 from waaaaayy down town. He was aware he was scoring a lot of points in a row and wanted more. I think he was really happy with jordan creating some offense when they were on the floor together. What still worries me a bit though, at times he moves his feet so slow on defense. But absolutely amazing game by lebron again, great passes great scoring.
Nance Jr. :
The garbage man! Does all the things nobody wants to do, or maybe just all the things TT doesn't want to do. He was so much better out there then TT. Maybe its match-ups, but he just was. He makes steven adams work on defense because he is all over the place. He is super active setting screens, cutting, jumping for offensive rebounds. He didn't always get the offensive rebound but he was always right there. This is absolutely invaluable. What was also great, he can defend perimeter players. He switched out onto westrbook a few times and he didn't really attempt anything against him. With nance,hood,lebron and green on the floor they can basically switch everything. Absolutely love nance he is super valuable to this team and I think jordan feels better playing with Nance.
Jordan:
Gave us some much needed offensive late in the game and helped us secure the win. I think he he's happy playing with nance and lebron is happy with jordan haha. So the team is quite happy i believe. He even made some shots that could have been classified as bad shots. But aslong as he makes them .. i suppose. SO give him credit for coming through offensively but what i liked was his defensive intensity he was getting really low on his defensive stand moving his shorts up ready to pick up westbrook. Now thats what I really like to see.
Hood:
Continue to fearlessly pull the trigger on threes kind of like JR, only he is bigger and more talented offensively. I do wonder if we will see him create more himself on score from that. Scored 14 points, jordan 14, green 10 and nance 13. Thats some nice bench scoring! Our bench might be the best in the nba and I kind of had a feeling this would be our advantage. They will be our secret weapon in the play-offs. Replace TT with kevin love in the starting line-up and you can add another 15-20 points to our starting line-up.
Green:
I was afraid he might disappear to the background a bit with all the new players who might be more talented offensively then green. But he still contributes offensively in his own way and combined with the other players on defensive makes us very strong, athletic and versatile.
JR Smith:
Welcome back, for a while already but still. Pulling the trigger on those 3's again without thinking. Hustling and to his credit, i don't remember him making any stupid JR mistakes this game. At one point he dribbled into the paint but saw steven adams was there and dribbled out again, that might be the best play JR made in the game. Proud of him. Its so important for this team to keep bad decision making limited because it will kill us in the play-offs.
Overall: great game, I expected us to win, I was hoping we could have held them to fewer points though, like a 100-105 points. I guess we could credit those extra point to adams having an insane game. I hope this team will focus on defense the rest of the year. We can be so good defensively. I love how all-round this team is I think it is vital we keep moving the ball and lebron needs to limit holding the ball for 5-8 seconds as much as possible. We have the talent now to score but everyone needs to touch the ball. Cant wait for every other game we have this season, super excited! Lets go cavs!
Btw I don't care what anybody says, if we get to the finals with this team (Which i expect we will do) we will be the underdogs, but we can beat the warriors.