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Defense contains Wade, powers Cavs' 10th straight win 86 - 102
February 4, 2010
LeBron James stood tall near his locker, addressing the media with a towel wrapped around his neck and a large grin on his face. Shaquille O'Neal spotted his Cleveland Cavaliers teammate and smiled, going out of his way to pay James a look of respect. "LeBron is the CEO of this team," O'Neal said. "I'm a consultant." And after Thursday's 102-86 dismantling of the visiting Miami Heat, it's clear the Cavs are one extremely well-run basketball corporation. How good are the Cavs? Well, these days they're even spotting the other team a starting point guard for a half. At least, that was the case Thursday, when Daniel Gibson was again expected to fill-in for injured starter Mo Williams (shoulder) and key reserve Delonte West (finger). Except Gibson was also missing -- as his pregnant fiancée, R&B singer Keyshia Cole, had a false alarm just before tip-off.
All was under control for Gibson and Cole by halftime, and Gibson returned to play in the third quarter. No point guards? No problem. Not when you have a man like James. Not when you're riding a 10-game winning streak. Not when you've been showing the depth and balance and chemistry the Cavs (40-11) have been putting on display lately. "I don't like to get too happy or too giddy," O'Neal said. "But we're playing excellent basketball." That's no joke, as Dwyane Wade and the Heat (24-26) came into this game looking to avenge a loss last week in Miami. But as well as they played at times, they could never build a lead larger than two points. The Cavs, on the other hand, won by 16. One of the reasons was their ability to contain and frustrate the opposing team's superstar, something the Cavs have been doing a lot of lately. It happened again versus the Heat, as Wade scored 18 points in the first half, but missed his first nine shots of the second.
Not surprisingly, the Cavs used that portion of the game to pull away. "We just turned it up a little bit," James said of the Cavs' defense on Wade. "We try to see what type of rhythm he's going to be in to start. If he gets into a really good rhythm, then we'll switch the defense to put more pressure on him. We even double him sometimes and try to make him give up the ball and have other guys try to beat us. That's what we did tonight." Of course, Wade was still very good, finishing with 24 points, nine assists and four steals. But he made just 11 of his 26 field-goal attempts. Meanwhile, James scored 36, many of which came as the result of season-highs in free throws made (17) and attempted (21). He also passed for eight assists as -- you guessed it -- the starting point guard by default. "I knew I was going to have the ball in my hands a lot as the point-forward," James said. "With me being able to get the ball off outlets and rebounds, I can go coast to coast. I can do a lot of things point guards can't do. So I was aggressive and they fouled me." O'Neal added 13 points and eight rebounds, and J.J. Hickson scored 12. And despite the late arrival, Gibson tallied 12 points on a pair of 3-pointers and 6-for-7 shooting from the line. "That made it all worthwhile," Gibson said. "She [Cole] was pushing me to get here just as much as I was trying to get here myself. It was all in fun and good spirits."
Michael Beasley was magnificent for the Heat, scoring 21 points on 9-for-14 shooting and grabbing 12 boards. Still, the Heat lost for the second time in two nights after dropping a close one in Boston on Wednesday. "We're going through a tough stretch right now, no question about it," said Heat coach Erik Spoelstra. "The only way to get out of it is to fight through it. And you can't fight out of it any other way but collectively." Added Wade, "We had stretches tonight where we played pretty well. [Cleveland] is just better than us at the end." The Cavs have won 25 of their previous 29, and became one of just three teams to own a double-digit winning streak this season. Boston (11 in a row) and the L.A. Lakers (also 11 in a row) are the others.