Key: Grand Central
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With Wednesday’s victory over the Bulls, the Cavaliers have won their first two home games of the season. On Friday night, they look to make it two straight overall – including the first two meetings against their Central Division rivals, the Indiana Pacers.
In that thrilling win over the Bulls at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse, the Wine & Gold actually trailed for most of the night before hitting the afterburners in the fourth – holding off Chicago late on monster efforts from Kevin Love and Tristan Thompson, not to mention a thunderous left-handed flush by Collin Sexton in the closing moments to emphatically seal the deal.
After dropping their first three games, the Pacers got off the schneid on Wednesday, taking down Kyrie Irving and the Nets in Brooklyn. Playing the final game of an early-season three-game trip, Indiana lost Myles Turner to a sprained ankle in their win over Brooklyn, but got Jeremy Lamb – who poured in 25 points – back from a hip injury.
The first game of Indiana’s roadie was last Saturday’s matchup at RMFH – Cleveland’s first victory of the John Beilein Era. In that contest, the Cavs blew past the Pacers in the second quarter, taking a 20-point edge before holding them off the rest of the way. Indy has won five of the last seven overall against Cleveland – despite the Cavs splitting the two games here at Banker’s Life Fieldhouse last year.
Key: Large, In Charge
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Friday’s Central Division showdown was supposed to be a battle of two of the better big man tandems in the Eastern Conference before Turner suffered an ankle injury against the Nets.
The fourth-year man from Texas was off to a solid start this season, including an 11-point, 11-rebound double-double in last Saturday’s loss to the Cavs in Cleveland. He’s listed as week-to-week.
Indy’s other big – Domantas Sabonis – is off to an outstanding start to the season, averaging a team-best 22.8 ppg and 10.0 rpg through the first four games. In Wednesday’s win over the Nets, the 11th overall pick in 2016 led both squads with 29 points on 11-for-18 shooting, posting a plus-26 in 36 minutes of work. The Cavs, however, were able to hold him to a season-low 14-point effort last Saturday night.
Nothing has slowed down the Wine & Gold’s big men so far this season – with Kevin Love and Tristan Thompson becoming the first duo in franchise history to notch double-doubles through their first four games.
Against Chicago, Love tied a team record – snagging 16 rebounds in the first half and grabbing 20 on the night, his high-water mark as a Cavalier. He added 17 points on an efficient 6-of-10 shooting and led Cleveland with six assists – including a clutch bucket and a gorgeous assist to Collin Sexton in the game’s decisive closing moments.
Love’s 67 rebounds are the most ever by a Cavalier through the first four games of the year.
Thompson has been as good or better – leading Cleveland with 23 points on 11-of-19 shooting in Wednesday’s win, adding 10 boards and a career-high five blocked shots, the first Cavalier to post such numbers since Zydrunas Ilgauskas back in 2005.
Key: Bull-ish Market
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Both teams have gotten solid guard play through the first four games of the year.
The Pacers' key offseason acquisition, Malcolm Brogdon, has paid immediate dividends for Indy. He’s right behind Sabonis for the team’s scoring lead, averaging 22.0 points per – bolstered by his 30-point outburst last Saturday night in Cleveland. The former Rookie of the Year from Virginia led the NBA in free throw shooting a season ago and comes into tonight’s matchup leading the league in assists at 11.3 apg.
Another offseason pickup, Jeremy Lamb, is doing a nice job keeping Victor Oladipo’s spot warm – bouncing back from a hip injury to finish with 25 points on 11-of-19 shooting, adding seven boards in the Pacers' first win of the year on Wednesday night in Brooklyn.
The Cavaliers' young backcourt hasn’t been quite that good this year, but Darius Garland continues to show incremental progress while the Young Bull has simply picked up where he left off a season ago.
Garland struggled from the floor on Wednesday, going 4-of-11 from the floor and 1-of-3 from long-range – but that one triple, a difficult shot from right in front of Cleveland’s bench, wound up being a big bucket in the Cavs' fourth-quarter surge.
Sexton was even bigger in the final period – netting 10 of his 18 points in the quarter. Overall, Sexton finished 7-of-12 from the floor, topping the 16-point mark in his 21st consecutive contest, including 27 straight in double-figures dating back to last season.