S2* The Plain Dealer | cleveland.com MN Wednesday, June 17, 2015

Warriors 105, Cavaliers 97 NBA FINALS

Title chase is over Undermanned, overwhelmed James is dynamic, The Q is electric, but the Warriors are too much for Cavs to overcome

Commentary Chris Haynes [email protected] This time LeBron James gave it all he had, and in the end, he just didn’t have enough help. there’s no The are the 2014-15 NBA champions for the first time in 40 years after focus for defeating the Cavaliers 105-97 Tuesday at The Q. The Warrriors won the best-of-seven series, four our letdown games to two. James put in game highs of Quick takes 32 points and 18 rebounds to go on the War- with nine assists in 46 minutes. riors’ series- He had to fight and claw for each clinching win statistic. He was 13-of-33 from the over the Cava- field. After scoring his 12th , liers in the NBA James became the sixth player in Finals 2015... NBA history to reach 5,000 career 33 What’s a Bud postseason points. 51-year wait Shaw and Steph among family Curry led the Warriors with 25 and friends? points. Iguodala’s insertion into Other than the starting lineup changed the excruciating. dynamic of the series, and he was And ongoing. named Finals MVP. Curry also And in this case no great fault had five rebounds and eight as- of the Cavaliers, who made this sists. Eight of his points came in much harder on the Warriors the final quarter. than they ever could’ve ex- It was an incredible postsea- pected. son run considering the Cavaliers That’s the odd dynamic at work were without two members of here. There is no trap door ending their Big Three. The Q was elec- to bestow a title upon. Nobody re- tric and sheer pandemonium for ally to blame. two and a half quarters. But the This is one time where what noise subsided when it became could’ve been was so far out of clear that Warriors were not go- the Cavaliers’ control that it is PHOTOGRAPHS BY JOHN KUNTZ / NORTHEAST OHIO MEDIA GROUP ing to let up in the Cavaliers’ final trumped by what could well be if A Cavaliers fan protests a referee’s call that went against Cleveland in the first half Tuesday night at The Q. home game of the season. next season returns a healthy Ky- Golden State got out to a quick rie Irving and . 15-point lead in the opening quar- 33 The Cavs had so many reasons ter. Iguodala was given the open to lose this series and so few good midrange jumper off the pick- reasons to win it once Irving fol- and-roll game and he knocked lowed Love off the court and into down the shot consistently over nicely pressed suits for the re- a bigger, slower Timofey Mozgov. mainder of the playoffs. The jitters got to Cleveland 33 If there was one tease to this initially as it committed three one, it was watching J.R. Smith, 24-second shot-clock violations the most disappointing Cavaliers in the first seven minutes. player in the NBA Finals, heat up But just how they’ve been all late in the fourth quarter with the year, the Cavaliers stayed resil- game already decided. ient and didn’t allow the Warriors At one point in the fourth to run off with the game. They quarter, Smith, Iman Shump- picked up the intensity on the de- ert, and fensive end and held Golden State James Jones were a combined to 6-of-22 shooting in the second 4-for-21. quarter and Curry was limited to 33 This wasn’t the Indians losing two points. Game 7 to the Marlins in the 1997 The Cavaliers trapped Curry World Series. on the pick-and-roll all night, That chance at a championship forcing to be came out of left field after a so-so a scorer on the swing pass and regular season and suddenly pre- he had difficulties delivering. sented itself as entirely possible, That effort brought the Cavaliers then quickly evaporated. within two at intermission. This one looked entirely pos- From there Cleveland went sible after the January remake, cold. They couldn’t hit a shot, then became a long shot the min- going 6-for-22 in the third ute Irving went down. The only which resulted in a Golden State thing that made it a series was 12-point lead heading into the fi- LeBron James’ greatness. nal quarter. The momentum was Playing Game 6 on one day’s all there’s, and they never let go rest, he was mortal LeBron early on their way to a title. (a relative term for sure) before Despite the Warriors’ small finishing with 32 points, 18 lineup, committed rebounds and nine assists. To to playing big and it paid off for point out he’s won just twice in the most part. Mozgov produced six trips to the Finals is an in- 17 points, 12 rebounds and four justice after his performance in blocks while this series. contributed 15 points, 12 boards The Finals required so much and a . of James that he appeared to J.R. Smith ended the night be pacing himself early Tuesday with 19 points off the bench. night when the Warriors got out He nailed five threes, but all of to a 15-point lead. Golden State them came in the fourth quarter asserted its depth and talent ad- when the game was pretty much vantage again in the third quarter decided. when it extended its lead and ba- The Cavaliers have tons of sically put the Cavs in a position uncertainty going into the off- where they had to do something season, but for the time being, they hadn’t done all series — win the season they had shouldn’t the fourth quarter. be overlooked. It was a special 33 Golden State scored 28 points season that came up just short. in the first quarter and held a 15-point lead, prompting ABC to Summer League schedule: The show its Cleveland Sports Failures NBA Summer League teams of the montage. Cavaliers and Warriors will square Seemed a little early, unless you off on the first day of play in Las take into account that in 2007 I Vegas. The game will be Friday, believe they had reason to show it July 10, with tipoff set for 10:30 in the first half of Game 1 against Tristan Thompson ends the first half with a slam dunk as Draymond Green, left, and Leandro Barbosa defend. The Cavs went p.m. at the Thomas and Mack San Antonio. into the locker room trailing, 45-43. .

Warriors 105 Cavaliers 97 Warriors 4, Cavs 2 SCORING REBOUNDS SCORING REBOUNDS Game 1 at Golden State POS MIN FGM-A 3PM-A FTM-A +/- OFF DEF TOT AST PF ST TO BS BA PTS POS MIN FGM-A 3PM-A FTM-A +/- OFF DEF TOT AST PF ST TO BS BA PTS Warriors 108, Cavs 100 (OT) A. Iguodala F 36:21 9-20 3-8 4-10 +14 1 4 5 5 4 2 0 0 1 25 L. James F 46:42 13-33 2-10 4-8 -3 3 15 18 9 3 2 6 0 0 32 H. Barnes F 35:27 3-8 3-4 0-0 -2 0 2 2 2 3 1 0 0 1 9 T. Thompson F 37:27 7-12 0-0 1-2 -15 4 9 13 0 2 0 1 1 0 15 Game 2 at Golden State D. Green C 41:28 6-13 2-5 2-4 +11 1 10 11 10 5 3 3 1 1 16 T. Mozgov C 32:31 5-8 0-0 7-8 -6 7 5 12 2 3 0 3 4 1 17 Cavs 95, Warriors 93 (OT) K. Thompson G 24:40 2-7 1-3 0-0 +2 0 5 5 2 6 0 2 1 0 5 I. Shumpert G 35:58 1-6 0-3 6-8 -8 1 2 3 0 6 0 2 1 1 8 Game 3 at Cleveland S. Curry G 43:06 8-19 3-11 6-8 +14 0 6 6 8 3 3 3 0 2 25 M. Dellavedova G 25:20 0-3 0-0 1-2 -5 1 3 4 2 6 0 2 0 0 1 Cavs 96, Warriors 91 S. Livingston 32:19 4-6 0-0 2-2 +3 1 2 3 0 3 0 0 1 0 10 J.R. Smith 34:16 5-15 4-9 5-8 -7 0 5 5 1 3 1 1 1 2 19 Game 4 at Cleveland F. Ezeli 10:56 3-6 0-0 4-5 +5 3 1 4 0 2 0 1 1 1 10 J. Jones 27:24 1-5 0-4 3-3 +4 0 1 1 0 3 0 1 0 0 5 Warriors 103, Cavs 82 L. Barbosa 14:30 2-5 1-3 0-0 -9 1 2 3 1 1 2 0 0 1 5 M. Miller 00:11 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 D. Lee 01:13 0-1 0-0 0-0 +2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 J. Harris 00:11 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Game 5 at Golden State Warriors 104, Cavs 91 A. Bogut DNP - COACH’S DECISION B. Haywood DNP - COACH’S DECISION J. McAdoo DNP - COACH’S DECISION K. Irving NWT - FRACTURED LEFT KNEE CAP Game 6 at Cleveland B. Rush DNP - COACH’S DECISION S. Marion DNP - COACH’S DECISION Warriors 105, Cavs 97 M. Speights DNP - COACH’S DECISION K. Perkins DNP - COACH’S DECISION Online: For additional Total 240 37-85 13-34 18-29 7 32 39 28 27 11 9 4 7 105 Total 240 32-82 6-26 27-39 16 40 56 14 26 3 16 7 4 97 Cavaliers reports and photos, 43.5% 38.2% 62.1% TEAM REBS: 10 TOTAL TO: 9 39.0% 23.1% 69.2% TEAM REBS: 16 TOTAL TO: 19 go to cleveland.com/cavs