“The closeout game is always the hardest, and Boston is going to make it even harder”, said LeBron James, who rebounded from a playoff-low 11 points in Game 3 to score 34 in Game 4.
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After playing three halves against the Cavaliers, the Celtics said Thomas was done for the season.
Kyrie Irving added 24 points and Kevin Love finished with 15 for the Cavs, who never trailed and led by as many as 39 points in one of their most dominating wins of the series.
Irving said the Cavs reckoned with themselves at halftime.
While having almost no cap space and mostly draft picks and unwanted veterans to work with, Griffin has found ways to add Kevin Love, J.R. Smith, Iman Shumpert, Deron Williams, Kyle Korver, Andrew Bogut (for one minute), Channing Frye and Derrick Williams in the past few seasons.
“The “Big Three” were terrific tonight”, Lue said. James avoided that stain on his legacy with an otherworldly performance.
“Those two guys were incredible”, Stevens said.
Wow. And now he’s doing something most people don’t get to do.
“It should be the same for us”, James said. “They have a great team right now”.
Avery Bradley scored 19 and Jae Crowder 18 for Boston. “They don’t have a lot of weak links to go to, to go at”. He then sat out the fourth quarter of his 212th career postseason game.
“It’s never talked about (in the) National Football League, who’s the greatest quarterback”.
It’s worth noting that James is closing in on Jordan when it comes to the regular season scoring list as well: Jordan now ranks fourth with 32,292 points while James is seventh with 28,787 points. Irving made 47.3 percent of his shots and 40.1 percent from 3-point range.
Boston owned the first half, finishing with 21 made baskets while limiting the Cavaliers to 17.
The Warriors will unveil their NBA Finals giveaway T-shirts, with morning television news shows having the first opportunity to show Warriors fans the design live on air, on Tuesday, May 30.
Meanwhile, Jordan launched his postseason more gradually, making his playoff debut at age 22 and failing to reach the second round until he was 25. They were down, 74-49, at halftime of Game 3 of their first-round series against Indiana.
With James in foul trouble, Irving was forced to do more than ever and he delivered, scoring 19 in less than five minutes and 33 in a 19-minute stretch. It was their first lead since early in the opening quarter.
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These teams that have spent much of the post-merger days near the bottom of the standings were the cream of the crop in the 1950s led by star quarterback Graham and innovative coach Paul Brown in Cleveland and Lions Hall of Fame passer Layne and running back Doak Walker.
