James drops 44 as Cavs take down Thunder 102 - 89

Dec 13, 2009

If LeBron James is "The King" then Mo Williams was The Prince on Sunday night in Oklahoma City. LeBron lit up the Thunder for 38 points through the first three quarters of the game then suddenly cold for part of the fourth but Mo Williams made up the difference scoring 11 points during a three minute stretch in the final stanza, including three straight 3-pointers to turn a one point nail biter into a 102-89 Cavalier win. "The 3-pointers just killed us," said Thunder coach Scott Brooks. "They made a lot of shots down the stretch and we didn't." In fact Oklahoma City didn't make any shots at all during that time. Jeff Green's 3-pointer with 7:17 left in the game brought OKC (12-10) to within 88-87 of Cleveland (17-7) but the Thunder would miss their next 12 shots to fall behind 102-87. Nenad Krstic broke the drought with a meaningless layup with half a minute to play. "Our defense was tremendous late in the game," said Cavaliers coach Mike Brown. "We wanted to try to defend without fouling and we did a good job of that late in the game. And then Mo's shot was terrific."

The last of Mo Williams' string of long range bombs in the 4th quarter blew up the Thunder's hopes late in the game. Oklahoma City had knocked the ball away in the final seconds of a Cleveland possession only to have Williams grab the ball back near the halfcourt line and fire up a prayer that went in and silenced a roaring crowd. A four point Cav lead,that could have dropped to two or even one had the Thunder controlled the loose ball suddenly was seven. "That shot really took the air out of them," Williams told reporters while he soaked his feet in ice in the Cavs dressing room. "They said over on the bench it looked good when I released it." Williams finished with 22 points but LeBron James was the story for most of the night hitting a season-high 44 points, including five 3-pointers. "I can get it going every now and then," he joked after the game. "We just turned it up a notch as a team in the fourth quarter." "What can you say about LeBron? He really carried us tonight," Brown said. "Oklahoma City is tough, they play hard every play but when Mo hit that shot it really kind of deflated them." Kevin Durant once again led Oklahoma City with 29 points, Jeff Green had 26.

"We played hard tonight, we just didn't make shots at the end," Green said. We just have to put this behind us. The great thing about the NBA is we've got another game tomorrow night." Oklahoma City scored only 13 points in the critical fourth quarter, missing seven of their eight 3-point attempts. Cleveland on the other hand was 4-for-9 on 3-pointers in the fourth and shot almost 50 percent overall in the last 12 minutes. James and Durant dominated the first half. LeBron led all scorers with 23 points at the break, no one else on his team was in double figures. Durant led Oklahoma City with 17 points, 13 of them coming in the first quarter. Jeff Green also had a good half for the Thunder scoring 15 points. Hot shooting for the Thunder helped them to a 54-49 lead at the midway point. Oklahoma City was shooting 56.3 percent and holding Cleveland to 46.5 percent. The Thunder also grabbed four more rebounds than the Cavs, holding a 20-16 edge at halftime.

That all began to turn around in the third quarter and especially in the fourth. "The fourth quarter is always when we make our mark," James said. "We definitely played hard in the fourth. It felt good." Durant became just the third player in NBA history to average 28 or more points in the first 21 games of a season at age 21 or younger. He came into the game against Cleveland averaging 28.3 points per game, second in the league. The first two players to accomplish the feat also played in the game Sunday night. Shaquille O'Neal was the first to do it when he averaged 28.6 points in the first 21 games of the 1993-94 season and LeBron James was the second when he averaged 30.5 in the first 21 games of 2005-06.

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