Kevin Love, LeBron James too much as Cavs cruise against Magic

LeBron James joined Oscar Robertson on an exclusive National Basketball Association list and Kevin Love scored a season-high 35 points as Cleveland remained unbeaten at home.

Elsewhere, Kevin Durant marked his return from a hamstring injury with 27 points and six rebounds as Oklahoma City eased past Utah 111-89, with most of the damage done in the second quarter when the Thunder outscored the Jazz 40-26.

With his fifth assist, James moved past Norm Nixon (6,386) into 25th place and alongside Robertson, who finished his Hall of Fame career with 26,710 points and 9,887 assists.

The Magic’s defense appeared to be a rotation short all night, failing to not only slow down the Cavaliers hot shooters. but the best player on the planet in James. Aaron Rodgers is great. “In our league too much is trying to compare greats to greats instead of just accepting and acknowledging and saying, ‘Wow, these are just great players'”. And if you understand the history of the sport, then there is no way you could ever forget Oscar Robertson. “This guy, he averaged a triple-double for, like, forever”. Kevin Love (CLE) – 34 pts.; LeBron James (CLE) – 15 pts., 13 assts.

The story of the night, though, was James joining Robertson. “I think it may be the nature of the sport, and also, the prestige position in sports is quarterback”, James said. King James walked to the bench in the middle of a play, leading to a technical foul.

“It’s all about protecting home”, James said. “I can’t speak for everybody else”.

Magic coach Scott Skiles was left in no doubt about James’ place in the pantheon of legends following his latest showing. He can do it all, so I think we just make it hard for him and be up on him, being physical and he’s not going to have the best game. “He’s going to find everybody, find the open man”. When asked at shootaround Monday whether he had any fond memories of Miller’s playing career, James said, “Uh, no”, rather abruptly. And while he has spoken in the past about the career goal of ranking at the top of everybody’s list, he’d prefer we didn’t use these milestones as an occasion for evaluations aimed at elevating one player above another, thanks. “I’ve been very blessed to be with a lot of great teammates and two great organizations that allowed me to do some unbelievable things”, James said. They’re still defending – I don’t know if they’re the same defensive team they were a year ago, but they’re shooting the ball extremely well. “So it is very humbling to see my name linked with Big O, someone that I’ve always kind of admired”. “All the credit and respect to him for that”.

“He’s turning into an unbelievable player right before our eyes every night”, interim Coach Sam Mitchell said. “That’s an wonderful, incredible accomplishment”. “That’s pretty good company”.

Prior to Monday, the Cavs had won 32 straight regular-season games at The Q when scoring at least 100 points.

The Cavaliers’ 117 points are the highest point total the Magic have given up in a non-overtime game this season, and the Cavs made 53.1 percent of their shots. Widening the net to the top 25 is a bit of a disservice to Robertson, who still ranks sixth in assists and 11th in scoring.