With 9.9 seconds remaining, Dion Waiters was a hero, the rookie who saved the Cavaliers during an off night for its exhausted All-Star against the best team in the NBA.
With 2.9 seconds left, Waiters was to blame, the reason Kawhi Leonard was left wide open for a 3-pointer that sent San Antonio to a 96-95 victory over the Cavaliers on Wednesday night.
Waiters’ cold-blooded 20-footer gave the Cavaliers 95-93 edge in front of 12,162 at The Q, but his defensive mistake gave Leonard the game-winner. Waiters had cheated off Leonard — despite Byron Scott’s strict instructions not to — to help on a driving Tony Parker at the basket.
Kyrie Irving’s desperation attempt at the buzzer ricocheted off the backboard, as he lost his balance while Parker defended him.
“I blame myself,” Waiters said, shaking his head afterward. “I helped, but I helped too far.”
Waiters noted that’s the second time this season that his defensive lapse yielded a game-winning 3-pointer. The rookie left Ray Allen open Nov. 24 in Miami as the Heat triumphed, 110-108.
“I’ve just got to do a better job of just staying home,” Waiters said. “Defensively, you’ve got to shrink the floor and that’s what I tried to do. But I got over there late, and he hit the shot.”
The final possessions marred what had been a valiant effort by the Cavaliers against the 43-12 Spurs, who own the best record in the league. They did so with a struggling Irving, whose six points — on 2-for-15 shooting — were a season-low. Irving had complained a day earlier that he was more exhausted than he’d been at any other point in his career, that Monday’s game against Minnesota felt like “a triple back-to-back.”
Against the Spurs, Irving didn’t attack the basket as aggressively as he typically does, and afterward, he admitted he’d lost his legs.
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