Cavs hand Raptors first road loss of season

There are bigger challenges ahead, and no conclusions are being drawn, but … the Pacers’ problematic defense is beginning to show signs of progress.

Paul George had 21 points and 11 rebounds, and Jeff Teague added 20, and IN defeated the short-handed National Basketball Association champion Cleveland Cavaliers, 103-93. But in the Pacers’ last two wins, they’ve held opponents below 100 points while shooting a combined 36.5 percent from the floor.

DeMar DeRozan added 26 for the Raptors, who complained about fouls called against Lowry and Jonas Valanciunas in the final two minutes and a possible goaltending violation against the Cavs that wasn’t called in the closing seconds.

“We had our chances”, Love said. I will pick Cleveland over IN, especially with how the Cavs bring it on everytime they play.

C’mon Lavoy, trying to be positive over here. Cleveland settled for jump shots that didn’t fall, playing into the Pacers hands as they were to get out on the break. There’s a lot of steals, deflections and it builds confidence.

While this game is more relevant because of what seemed like a budding rivalry between James and Paul George in the former’s days with the Miami Heat, there are plenty of other storylines to follow for this game.

“We needed a win, we weren’t anxious who was going to be on the floor for them”, Teague said. Technicals-Indiana defensive three second, Indiana team.

“Just have to see”, Lue said. “We switched a little bit early and that wasn’t working”. I can actually remember a time being here (Indiana) where that was the case, might have been past year where Bron sat out and we just didn’t play hard. We gotta get back, gotta sprint back. He’d played well enough, but then he’d have games like the seven-points-on-10-shots night like he did against the Timberwolves Sunday. While their offense has been average their defense has been below average. It has gotten better. The whole quarter, I thought he was great.

The Cleveland Cavaliers (9-1) are set to take on the Indiana Pacers (5-6) in their first game without LeBron James.

“Our team is growing”, he said.

Zaza Pachulia wound up playing nearly the same number of minutes, mostly because of foul trouble. “We’re talking about him still and he didn’t even play tonight. We made them put the ball on the floor, which some of their guys don’t like to do”. Nik Stauskas contributed 15, and Dario Saric had 13 points and 12 rebounds.

The streaking Warriors made it five consecutive wins thanks to Curry’s 35 points and 30 from Durant.

Myles Turner had 12 points, eight rebounds and four blocks. Jeff Teague and Thaddeus Young both scored 11 points as starters. The Pacers received favorable news earlier in the afternoon when Cleveland announced they’d be resting LeBron James on the second night of a back-to-back, but it didn’t dampen Indiana’s effort in the slightest. Then a lost match from Atlanta team by (106-110), this is the 1st lost of the Cleveland of this season. They kept finding answers and hanging in there, taking a late lead.

Cleveland trailed 110-103 with 4:24 to play, but that’s around the time Kyrie Irving got hot and scored eight of his 24 points in a two-minute flurry to help the Cavs pull away. This is the first time that King James will not be playing in a game this season. That’s on the team. The Raptors stayed within one or two scores in a finish marred by some questionable whistles on both sides, but couldn’t get back on top to notch anything more than a moral victory that, for their part, they’re not all that interested in claiming. “We didn’t know what that meant”.

“We base our team and our game on defence and we’ve got to get that back”.

Despite missing their first six attempts, the Cavs wound up 11 of 30 from the 3-point line, extending their NBA-record streak to 11 games in a row with double-digit makes. With Oscar Robertson watching from close to the Cavs bench, LeBron James fell one rebound shy of a triple-double with 28 points, 14 assists and nine rebounds.

The Pacers committed just 10 turnovers on the evening, their fourth straight game with 13 or fewer giveaways.

“He thinks the game”, Norm Powell said when asked why James is such a tough cover.

McMillan was not surprised by James’ decision.

“It was just a high octane offensive game, but for us, we can’t play like that”, Lowry said. “He needed the rest so we’re going to rest him”.

Guard J.R. Smith missed the game because of a sprained.