The Cleveland Cavaliers will once again have to wait until next year as they were defeated in the NBA Finals by the Golden State Warriors.
In what was one of the most convincing NBA Finals wins ever, the Warriors eviscerated the Cavaliers on their home floor in Game 6 to claim their first NBA Finals victory in over 40 years.
Cleveland’s wait has been longer, but it’s a wait that will continue. Rather than having history on their side, the Cavaliers were torched by the Splash Brothers and their supporting cast of Andre Iguodala and Draymond Green.
It was pretty much a one horse race right out of the gate.
Despite the Warriors going on a huge run early, LeBron James refused to let the game slip away from him.
Things got a little testy early on as well, with the Warriors taking a huge lead and the Cavaliers taking exception to it. However, sometimes players just play hard and that resulted in some questionable flops on the part of Warriors players in Game 6.
The physicality extended to basketball plays as well, with Timofey Mozgov throwing down a dirty block that kept his conscious clean.
No matter how good the Cavaliers played though, one thing you can never forget is how amazing Steph Curry is and how he inspires his teammates to take their own game to the next level.
Then again, ignoring your head coach’s halftime pep talk is what leads to your opponent going on a 16-4 run to start the second half.
The Cavaliers proceeded to implode after that clearly rousing halftime pep talk, and the end result was a disastrously embarrassing NBA Finals loss by Cleveland. There was one final LeBron James moment in the fourth quarter, but the fact that is came with over ten minutes left in the game just makes it sad in hindsight.
The Warriors are NBA Champions, and that’s the way it should be. Injuries aside, the NBA Finals were dominated by the Warriors when it mattered, and the Cavaliers fell apart at the seams. They played terrible defense, didn’t hit shots and put too much on LeBron James.
We can’t discount the fact that the Cavaliers were in a position they shouldn’t have been and still almost won. Without Kyrie Irving or Kevin Love, the Cavaliers still managed to make it to the NBA Finals and at one point take a 2-1 series lead. Even their final minute was filled with grit and guts, as J.R. Smith made it a four-point game with just over half-a-minute left.
That’s the spirit of this Cavaliers team and it’s a spirit that wasn’t crushed in the NBA Finals, rather it will grow from this and become even stronger next year. The Cavaliers will have more chances in the future, and to see them grow as fast as they have in LeBron’s first year back is as encouraging as things have ever been in Cleveland.
Let’s look on the bright side, but never forget the bitter taste this left. LeBron never forgot after his first year in Miami and look how that ended up turning out.