The Cleveland Cavaliers came away with a massive victory over the Oklahoma City Thunder.
The NBA was spoiled on Wednesday with a matchup featuring the top offense and top defense in the league. The 30-5 Oklahoma City Thunder hit the road to take on the 31-4 Cleveland Cavaliers. With the matchup being aired on ESPN, many had the opportunity to watch two of the league’s gauntlets.
The matchup lived up to the hype, too as the Cavaliers defeated the road team 129-122 in what could very well be an NBA Finals preview.
It was a high-scoring affair, which was to be expected given Cleveland’s stature as the top offense in the league. The Thunder, defensively, couldn’t do enough to slow the Cavaliers down while also just not having quite enough offensively to keep up.
Cleveland head coach Kenny Atkinson put it perfectly. It was a great regular season game, regardless of the end result.
“Was that a great basketball game? Forget who won and who lost. Great for the game,” Atkinson said after the game. “Playoff atmosphere, pure competition. It was just a great game for the league, for the fans.”
Two secret weapons turned the tide for the Cavaliers
The Cavaliers are an incredible team. They were heading into the matchup as the top offense in the NBA with a 31-4 record. Taking on a top defense, though, it took some extra help from the bench to secure a massive victory.
Two Cleveland bench players put together highly efficient games to help will them to victory. Ty Jerome, a backup guard, scored 15 points against his former squad, doing so while shooting 6-of-7 from the field and in an impressive 12 minutes played.
Jerome wasn’t the only one, though. Max Strus, who missed the team’s first 27 contests this season, scored an additional 17 points in 28 minutes played, also shooting 6-of-7 from the field.
The two role players provided high-level, efficient play off the bench gave the Cavaliers a much-needed boost to push them past the No. 1 team in the Western Conference. Of course, outside of Donovan Mitchell, the Cavaliers got solid production from their starters — and Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen in particular.
No matter how the starting lineup performs, though, there is room for error when players like Jerome and Strus play to the level in which they did. In the current era of the NBA, there is strength in numbers, and the Cavaliers proved to have such in the massive victory.
No need to fret for the Thunder
The Cavaliers made a statement with this win, there is no doubt about that. For Oklahoma City, on the other hand, there is no cause for concern. Their 15-game winning streak just now came to an end, and they recently took down the reigning champion Boston Celtics.
The Thunder also get another shot at the Cavaliers in just over a week, this time coming in the Paycom Center on their home floor.
Still, there’s even more reason to be confident in Oklahoma City, beyond their 30-6 record and recent 15-game win streak. That reason? They played this game close without one of their top players. Chet Holmgren has been sidelined for nearly two months now and will make his return sometime in the near future.
The Thunder played this game without a top-three player and lost to the best team in the league by just seven points. They were without Alex Caruso and Ajay Mitchell, too. With both teams fully healthy, this game gets that much more intriguing.
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