Written by Jesse Lamovsky

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Kyrie Irving was five days short of his first birthday the night Steve Nash, as a short-haired freshman guard, made his first appearance on the national scene in Santa Clara’s 1993 NCAA Tournament upset of Arizona. Nineteen years later, matched up against the now-long haired wizard from Canada, Irving was the best player on the court. Kyrie’s sensational evening got the Cavaliers back to .500 with a 101-90 victory over the Suns at the Building Formerly Known as America West Arena. Cleveland is now 2-3 on this grueling road trip, with a quick turnaround Friday night in Los Angeles.

Playing 28 minutes, Irving scored a career-high 26 points on 11-of-17 shooting, made both of his free-throw attempts and knocked in 2-of-4 from downtown, adding six assists and two steals. Granted, a bunch of Irving’s points came against Nash, who hasn’t exactly been racking DPOY’s during his long career. But it wasn’t that he scored- it was how. Kyrie made big scores Thursday night and single-handedly transformed the game with a blistering second-quarter run.

It started toward the midway point with Cleveland as ice-cold as the winter weather back on the shores of Lake Erie. After starting out hot, the Cavaliers went nearly five minutes without a basket as Phoenix steadily built a 40-32 lead. The Suns seemed about to vanish over the horizon when Kyrie Irving took over.  

After an Alonzo Gee jumper broke the spell, Irving ripped off 12 unanswered points in three minutes. His second three-pointer of the one-man run gave Cleveland the lead with 5:19 remaining in the half and the capper, a weaving spin move and layup through traffic, was sensational. By then it was 46-40 in favor of the Cavaliers, and they never trailed again.

Late in the fourth quarter, with the Suns within seven and surging, Irving entered for Ramon Sessions and immediately went to work on the clinching buckets. The rookie simply bulled through Nash for two baskets and found Anderson Varejao on the pick-and-roll to make it 98-90 with less than a minute left. With LeBron James gone, it’s nice to see a player making the kind of plays a franchise player makes. Kyrie made those plays in Arizona Thursday night.

Not that the youngster didn’t have help. Anderson Varejao didn’t shoot well, going 3-of-10, but still hauled down a season-high 17 rebounds, including seven on the offensive end. Antawn Jamison scored 23 on 10-of-22 shooting. Daniel Gibson scored ten off the bench and played active defense all night, accounting for two of Cleveland’s ten steals. Tristan Thompson played 15 minutes, tallied seven points and six rebounds, and showed the strength and defensive skill that make him an intriguing core player, if not a future star.

Tristan’s highlight came when he muscled through weak, slow Robin Lopez for a hoop-with-harm early in the second quarter (Cleveland’s only made basket in a span of six minutes.)  The ensuing free throw barely grazed the bottom of the net. He’s got a ways to go in that area.

I’ll admit, I’m a little torn. Look, this team needs another really good player- a really good wing player, to be specific- to duplicate the Oklahoma City experiment and get back into contention. The best way to get that player is to lose games this season and get a heaping helping of lottery balls into the hopper. Going 33-33 and securing the eighth seed in the playoffs is not the best way to get better in the long term. We know what that state of affairs looks like- it’s coached by Mike Fratello and sports paint-splotch uniforms that I wish the team were bold enough to wear on a Throwback Night.

But I’m a Cleveland fan. In the heat of emotion, away from cold reason, I root for Cleveland teams to win, every time. It was fun watching Kyrie ball and the Cavaliers win, even in a meaningless game against a Phoenix team that is going absolutely nowhere in the West. Who am I kidding? I’d root for a firing squad if it said “Cleveland” on its uniforms.

Next: The Cavaliers take on the Lake Show at Staples Friday night, 10:30.