Cleveland Cavaliers: Three takeaways from 124-112 loss to Wizards

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Washington Wizards guard Bradley Beal finishes an easy one in transition versus the Cleveland Cavaliers. (Photo by Jason Miller/Getty Images) /

Collin Sexton and Larry Nance Jr. played great for the Cleveland Cavaliers on Thursday, but it wasn’t nearly enough, as the Washington Wizards handed the Wine and Gold their sixth straight loss.

The Washington Wizards, like the Cleveland Cavaliers, have really struggled this year and have a 15-29 record, which puts them 11th in the Eastern Conference. As our own Dan Gilinsky wrote coming into this matchup between the two teams on Thursday, this was setting up to be a “get right” game for Cleveland.

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After all, the Wizards aren’t exactly world-beaters, as they have the NBA’s worst defensive rating in the 2019-20 season, as noted by NBA.com, and on top of that, Washington just went into overtime at the Miami Heat on Wednesday and lost in a tight one, too.

The Cavs actually were able to get off to a fast start in this game, though, and raced out to an 18-6 lead, led by Sexton scoring eight points in that span.

Cleveland looked like the team that was well-rested and had energy, as they should’ve, while the Wizards looked like the team that was on the second night of a back-to-back, but also having to go into overtime the night before.

After that, not a ton went right for the Cavaliers. Washington basically dominated the game the rest of the way, with star guard Bradley Beal leading all scorers with 36 points on 15-of-22 shooting, as shown by ESPN.

Defensively, the Cavs couldn’t slow the Wizards down, as the visitors got whatever they wanted the rest of the night, shooting 55.3% for the game, while hitting 16 three-pointers and knocked in their triples on a 44.4% clip.

With what’s happened in the past week is a step back in this rebuild and this is trending in the wrong direction. Cleveland has lost four straight to teams with losing records, in the Memphis Grizzlies (though they are trending up and are now 20-24), Chicago Bulls, New York Knicks and Washington.

The Cavs for most of the year were competitive against teams like these and won a good number of those games. Cleveland at home should be right there all the way in these games and with what’s happened in the past week is concerning with how things are going.

Aside from Collin Sexton‘s big bounce back game and Larry Nance Jr. tying a career-high with 22 points (per Basketball Reference) on 10-of-14 shooting and having 12 rebounds and three assists, as shown by ESPN, not much went right for the Cavs.

With that said, we’ll look at three takeaways from Cleveland’s 124-112 loss to the Wizards on Thursday.