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Noah Poinar

tristanvsjazzWhen Danny Ferry resigned back in 2010, Chris Grant was simply the next guy in line for promotion.  At least to Cavs fans he was; frankly, either way, we were too depressed to give-a-crap.  At that point nothing mattered, we were all self acclaimed NBA GM’s, all you had to do was find a way to fleece one of the league’s eight superstars.  

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Demetri Inembolidis

130306-CLEUTA-05It was a scene that we've all seen many times. The script was all too familiar to the Cavalier faithful. Down by one point, Mo Williams easily made his way into the paint and he flipped up a floater. This is a shot that he has taken countless times and makes more often than not. The ball rolled around the rim, went down, defied the law of gravity and flew out. It fell right into the hands of a member of the Utah Jazz before slipping out of bounds. The game was over despite the fact that Mo Williams still had another missed three pointer in him. Not only was the law of gravity defied, but Lawler's law was as well. Despite having a 101-95 lead with 1:47 remaining in the game, the Jazz gave up a 9-0 run to end the game and left the court stunned.

This was a much needed win for the Cavaliers. They have had some tough losses lately. The Cavs rallied in Miami and lost, gave up a game winning shot to the Spurs and lost a 22 point first half lead in a loss to the Knicks on Monday. The Cavs have had their fair share of late-game success this year, but the timing of this come-from-behind win against the Jazz couldn't have been better.

The Cavs looked rusty throughout most of the game. It is difficult to quantify why, but they simply looked a step slow and as if they were not giving great effort. Kyrie Irving is Cleveland's best player, but he did not play like it for much of the game. He spent the first three quarters deferring to his inferior teammates. With Dion Waiters out with the flu, this was not the night for Irving to be deferring to the likes of Alonzo Gee, Tyler Zeller and Shaun Livingston.

The game would have probably gone the way of the Utah Jazz had Irving and CJ Miles not played very well in the final 12 minutes. Miles scored 12 points in that stretch. It's possible that Miles wanted to perform well against his old team. Whatever the motivation, it was more than welcome.

The win was not an easy one for Cleveland. They had to survive 25 points from Gordon Hayward. The bench for the Jazz was incredible. Three players combined for 56 points. It would have probably been higher had Al Jefferson played. Byron Scott said before the game that the Cavs would need "Tabasco sauce and gun powder" to combat the Jazz big man rotation. Tristan Thompson, Marreese Speights and (to less of an extent)Tyler Zeller not only did that, but they arguably outplayed them. The Jazz scored 42 points in the paint compared to Cleveland who had 48.

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Jesse Lamovsky

Monday night’s 102-97 loss to the New York Knicks at the Q showed, once again, that the Cavaliers haven’t yet found a lead they can’t let slip away. Cleveland blew a 22-point first-half lead in near-spectacular fashion against a New York team that came in still stunned from its own second-half meltdown against the Heat on Sunday. The stunner broke a ten-game losing streak in the Q for New York.

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Demetri Inembolidis

laccle-130301-02 0The Los Angeles Clippers have not had a lot of success in Cleveland. You would have to go all the way back to the 2001-2002 season to find the last time that they were able to beat the Cleveland Cavaliers on the road. The date was March 10, 2002 and the Cavs were wrapping up what would become a 29 win season. To put things into perspective, of the 22 players that participated in that game, only Elton Brand and Andre Miller continue to collect NBA paychecks.

The home winning streak against the Clippers came to an end on Friday night. When news broke that Kyrie Irving would miss his third straight game with a hyper-extended knee, it all but guaranteed that this would happen. The Clippers are one of the few elite teams in the NBA and the Cavs have to play a near flawless game to beat them. For example, Cleveland beat the Clippers in Los Angeles on November 5, 2012 by a score of 108-101. It took a fully healthy roster and 7 made three pointers by Dion Waiters for the narrow win.

For the first time in three games, the Cavs did not start the game very badly. Tristan Thompson once again had a good start for the Cavaliers. His activity on the boards helped him record 6 points and 6 rebounds in the quarter. Not to be outdone, eastern conference rookie of the month Dion Waiters was even more aggressive than Thompson. He took and made 4 shots en route to 9 points. Foul trouble plagued Waiters throughout the game. Byron Scott had to make the tough decision to sit Waiters after he picked up his second foul with 2:51 remaining in the first. The Cavs trailed by 1 point when the substitution happened and they were outscored by a 9-2 margin to end the quarter.

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Demetri Inembolidis

162779715The talk on social media on Tuesday was that this would be forever remembered  as "the Luke Walton Game." On the surface, Luke Walton's 8 points, 5 rebounds, 5 assists and a steal are not that impressive. Of every player in the match-up between the Chicago Bulls and Cleveland Cavaliers, he had the highest +/- with a +13. The reason Walton had great success despite not having a great box score was his veteran presence. The ball seemed to move better when he was in the game. He took good shots. His defense was smart. Last but not least, he played with great effort. This was most evident when he chased down a loose ball after two made Cavalier free throws that practically won the game and knocked it off Kirk Hinrich's leg.

The win against the Bulls was significant for the young Cavs. They were without superstar Kyrie Irving due to a hyper-extended knee. Going into the game, the Bulls have won 11 straight against the Cavs. In fact, you would have to go back to the LeBron James era to find the last time that the Cavs beat the Bulls in the regular season. To win a game against a team that has 11 straight wins against you is impressive. To do it on the road is even more impressive. To do it without your best player is incredible.

The Cavs got off to a slow start and had to overcome a large deficit. After a little over four minutes, the Cavs found themselves trailing by a score of 11-2 after shooting 12.5%. Tristan Thompson did his best to keep the Cavs in the game. Thompson had 9 points and 3 rebounds in the first quarter. He played a little too aggressively at times during the quarter, but his energy appeared to be infectious on the rest of the team. By the time the first quarter was over. the Cavs only trailed by a score of 22-19. This was quite promising considering the slow start that the team had.

After being benched quickly in the first twelve minutes, Dion Waiters played the entire second quarter. He had an effective stretch. Waiters finished the quarter with 10 points on 7 shots. Waiters has looked great as of late. Against the Bulls, he had 25 points on 10-16 shooting. Leading up to the game on Tuesday, Waiters has been shooting 14.1 points on 50.9% shooting. A lot of people, including myself, were critical of Cavaliers general manager Chris Grant for selecting an out of shape guard who did not work out for the team or start in college with the fourth overall pick. The recent play of Dion Waiters has shown that we should be patient before casting final judgements on young players. In two weak drafts, Chris Grant has managed to get a superstar and two players who look like legitimate rotation players on good teams.

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