When the Cavaliers’ brass assembled the Big Three two summers ago, they must have envisioned a game like Sunday afternoon’s playoff performance as the exact blueprint.
The Wine and Gold’s three stars – LeBron James, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love – combined for 81 points as Cleveland rallied past a determined Pistons squad to take Game 1 of their First Round matchup, 106-101, at Quicken Loans Arena.
Love and LeBron each notched double-doubles and Irving led all scorers with 31 points, but the Cavs were locked in a dogfight with Detroit all afternoon – overcoming a seven-point deficit early in the fourth quarter and holding the Pistons off in the final two minutes.
Neither team led by double-digits on Sunday in an affair that featured 21 ties and 17 lead-changes. Cleveland’s biggest lead – nine points – came with 11 seconds left in the ballgame.
Irving – who missed most of the NBA Finals matchup with Golden State last year – caught fire after intermission, scoring Cleveland’s first eight points of the second half and 10 of his 31 in the third quarter. On the afternoon, the three-time All-Star went 10-for-24 from the floor, including 5-of-10 from long-distance, to go with six assists, five boards, two steals and a blocked shot.
“Our third quarters haven’t been the best this season, but coming into the playoffs, we know that possessions really matter,” said Irving, of his third-quarter outburst. “Guys just did a great job setting screens coming out in the second half.”
Love finished the regular season on a strong run and parlayed that right into the Playoffs – playing aggressively on both ends and finishing with a postseason career-high of 28 points, going 10-of-22 from the field and 4-of-8 from beyond the arc, adding a game-high 13 boards in the win.
LeBron, getting the 179th playoff start of his illustrious career, added 22 points on 9-for-17 shooting, leading both squads with 11 assists to go with six boards, two steals and a pair of blocks.
“Our objective in this series is to be aggressive and attack; we don’t want to bail them out with jump shots,” said Tyronn Lue. “We want to attack, get downhill, get to the paint, and then we can kick out for threes. I thought The Big Three did a phenomenal job of doing that.
“I thought Kevin set the tone early, posting up in the paint, getting deep and getting a couple of fouls on their four-man. It all started from there.”
The Pistons were led by a pair of unlikely sources – Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, who led Detroit with 21 points, and Marcus Morris, who added 20 (although just a single point in the second stanza).
Overall, the Pistons shot 51 percent from the floor and 52 percent from three-point range, compared to 44 and 34 percent, respectively, for the Wine and Gold. But Cleveland held Detroit’s All-Star big man, Andre Drummond, to a pedestrian 13-point, 11-rebound performance and Tobias Harris to just nine points on 4-for-11 shooting.
The Cavaliers didn’t get much from their other starters or the bench on Sunday. J.R. Smith finished with just nine points, going 3-of-7 from long-distance, and – despite leading both teams with four offensive boards – Tristan Thompson scored just single bucket in Game 1.
Matthew Dellavedova led the reserves with seven points but Richard Jefferson made the bigger impact – canning pair of big fourth-quarter jumpers, including a big triple early in the period to cut Detroit’s lead in half.
As a team, the Cavaliers outscored the Pistons in the paint (38-24), on the break (11-6) and on second-chance opportunities (20-6). Cleveland handed out 25 assists and committed just five turnovers in Sunday’s win.
With the victory, the Cavaliers have now taken nine straight postseason games against the Pistons – improving their all-time mark to 12-6 overall and 8-1 at Quicken Loans Arena.
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