Cavs' forward look for redemption while last year's Finals MVP hope ailing back holds up while defending a focused LeBron James
Steve Aschburner
With two straight victories, and 41 more points from their star, the Cavs can become the first team to rally from 3-1 down in The Finals.
Led by Irving, James, Cavs shoot 53 percent from field.
Warriors contend rules unfair to teams making deep playoff runs
Second half dooms Cleveland, which will need a historic run to keep Golden State from a second straight title
With Kevin Love out, Tyronn Lue's decision to start Richard Jefferson over other possible options proves to be key.
.... but Cleveland will need his offense if it wants to take Game 2
Commissioner hopes to have resolution on North Carolina soon; also touches on hack-a-Shaq and other key issues before Game 1
The multi-skilled, 6-foot-9 forward and the sharpshooting, lithe, 6-foot-3 guard contrast in their physiques, skills and more.
Holding everyone accountable, breeding confidence and instilling 'sense of calmness,' rookie coach has franchise four wins from title.
Bismack Biyombo channels his inner Dikembe Mutombo in Game 3 with an epic 26-rebound, four-block performance
Cavaliers forward, along with James, Irving have not missed a beat in 14 postseason games they have played together
With LeBron James doing all sorts of LeBron James things, Cleveland has overwhelmed Toronto through two games
Inbounds plays are the green beans of NBA games, not all that interesting until the day they suddenly line up on your dinner plate and dance like the Rockettes in a Christmas spectacular.
Lowry, DeRozan must shake slump in Game 7 at home on Sunday
Cleveland reaches the Eastern Conference semifinals fully healthy, while Detroit finds value in its brief postseason run.
Coach on Johnson: a 'learning experience for a 19-year-old kid'.
Cleveland has raised its game over the past three weeks
Legendary guard who once led the NBA in assists and points in a single season has vast admiration for Golden State's star
Chicago's season is crumbling after a coaching change and plans for more offence have left its trademark style toothless.
How the 21-year-old, 6-foot-11 forward from Greece has shined as the Bucks primary playmaker since the All-Star break.
Missteps by management, on-court issues and injuries have all played a role in preventing both teams from ascending to next level
Resolute Portland is exceeding expectations as it races toward a playoff berth many doubted it would achieve.
Third wheel or not, talented forward realizes the Cavaliers present the 'best scenario' for him in quest for championship
Cavs show off their looser, faster side in statement win over Spurs
While LeBron and Cleveland continue to figure things out with new coach, steady San Antonio remains the same as ever
Pluses and minuses of a 73-win season weigh heavily on the minds of Golden State's players and coaches.
Cleveland's 132-98 defeat is worst home loss by a LeBron team.
Post-heavy scheme hasn't limited San Antonio's hearty assist game.
CHICAGO — It almost didn't seem right. Kawhi Leonard and Jimmy Butler have worked so hard, done so much right, shouldered increasingly hefty loads for their respective teams in San Antonio and Chicago and plumbed the depths of their potential in four-plus NBA seasons, only to end up guarded by Kawhi Leonard or Jimmy Butler.
CHICAGO – Plaudits have rolled in from most precincts in the NBA, rivals and friends celebrating and reminiscing about Lakers great Kobe Bryant as if he’s not going to still be around for another five months.
As tonight's matchup with Chicago nears, San Antonio is again among the NBA's upper crust.
Finally getting consistent playing time, the fourth-year guard is putting together a career season which could result in awards.
It was late, they had just gone 58 minutes against the world's best player and the East's best team and the Milwaukee Bucks who still were around were in no hurry to go home.
CHICAGO — Nicolas Batum was on his phone until he absolutely had to go, introductions and an anthem and, on this night, a moment of silence forcing him from the visitors' dressing room at United Center. Some two hours later, he was back, scrolling through messages, poking back texts of his own.
At 20, Andrew Wiggins already is starting to look like the All-Star wing insiders projected three or four years into the future.
After the first 99 books, one might think Pat Williams had said in those tens of thousands of pages everything he possibly could want or have to say.
One is professional. The other, far more personal. And even though there's considerable overlap in the game, the rules, the teachings and the ingredients that lead to success, the NBA and the NCAA brands of basketball involve two separate cultures, two different vibes.
Returning to the Orlando Magic this season after 21 years, Scott Skiles brought a reputation as a turnaround artist whose greatest challenge has been sticking around after the turnaround.
CLEVELAND — The headlines LeBron James had grabbed in recent days mostly were the wrong kind, dwelling on his aching back, anti-inflammatory injections and a newfound vulnerability of one of the NBA's most durable and physically imposing figures.
MILWAUKEE — Greg Monroe broke hearts over the summer in the greater metropolitan New York area when he passed on a chance to sign as a free agent with the Knicks and chose instead the Milwaukee Bucks as his destination.
The most successful coach in Wolves' history was mercurial, but had no problem laughing at himself and never held a grudge.
Achieving something none of their teams did during the Michael Jordan-Scottie Pippen run of NBA championships, the Chicago Bulls have had an All-NBA centre each of the past two seasons.
CHICAGO – Already, they call it Hoiball.
The announcement by Golden State that Warriors coach Steve Kerr is taking a leave of absence to recover from back surgery brought the number of NBA head coaches dealing with health issues this preseason to two.
CHICAGO – No rhyme, no reason. Could be that Derrick Rose is snake-bit, whatever that is. Could be karma or kismet or some other form of lousy luck. Could be that one of his luxury residences is built on a sacred burial ground and the payback stinks.
CHICAGO — The opposite of love isn't hate, it's indifference, Nobel prize winner Elie Wiesel said. And right now, the sports fans of Chicago are embroiled in a torrid indifference affair with Bulls star Derrick Rose.
It’s been a couple of days since Moses Malone died unexpectedly at age 60 Sunday in Norfolk, Va.
The trait that helped Dick Bavetta earn enshrinement in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame is a trait for which NBA officials generally are neither rewarded nor lauded: Personality.
LAS VEGAS — No one got injured in USA Basketball’s “Showcase” scrimmage Friday, not even the basketball scribe who narrowly avoided getting beaned by a TV monitor knocked off the table behind him in the tiered media section. (I did feel the breeze and flinch when it crashed, though).
A slew of the NBA's top players in Las Vegas are fueled by the big goals.
LeBron James showed up, warmed up and participated in Team USA's minicamp workout Wednesday, looking in his blue No. 27 practice jersey like any of the other players on USA Basketball's 34-man roster.
Seeing Kevin Durant on a basketball court again, after his out-of-sight, out-of-mind absence stretching back nearly six months, seemed to perk up a lot of the folks not merely watching but participating in Team USA's minicamp workout Tuesday.
Three-day camp has 34 NBA players competing for '16 Olympics.
No one really knows what to expect this season from Roy Hibbert as the former All-Star centre moves from the Indiana Pacers to the Los Angeles Lakers in search of a clean slate.
Klay Thompson's brother Trayce Thompson makes MLB debut.
There is no way to sugar-coat the theme of the Providence Journal‘s story: It is about a fall from grace, or at least from a fall from the heights of professional sports success to one of those humdrum lives of quiet desperation the poets bemoan.
Team plans to wear 'Hickory' uniforms for several games this season, but not everyone is pleased with nostalgia.
In the waning hours of the NBA's free-agent "moratorium" period, with verbal agreements worth only much as the paper they weren't written on, Greg Monroe, his family, some friends and members of the Milwaukee Bucks' front office and coaching staff gathered Wednesday evening for a celebratory dinner.
Summertime, and reneging is easy...
“Unfinished business” was the term Kevin Love used, more or less kicking off the first day of NBA free agency Wednesday with his announcement, via The Players’ Tribune, that he would be sticking with Cleveland Cavaliers in pursuit of LeBron James-led championships.
All this talk about LeBron James, master strategist, working his contract levers, pulleys and buttons to become, in a few years, the NBA’s first player to earn $40 million in a season is fascinating.
If the Cleveland Cavaliers make it back to the Finals next June and find themselves facing a familiar LeBron James nemesis, the San Antonio Spurs, remember this day.
The Bulls went shopping for a point guard and came home with a power forward.
If this were, say, 10 years ago and both Tim Duncan and Paul Pierce were hitting free agency July 1, the NBA landscape already would be quivering in anticipation.
At the end of a long, tortuous NBA season and postseason pockmarked, undermined and largely defined by injuries, the healthiest team among those that mattered, the Golden State Warriors, captured the 2014-15 championship Tuesday night at Quicken Loans Arena.
For more than a week, as games ticked off the schedule of these 2015 Finals, the Golden State Warriors, their fans and much of the basketball world waited for Steph Curry. To be Steph Curry.
OAKLAND – Steve Kerr lied to the media Thursday night to hide a strategic adjustment for Game 4 of the 2015 Finals until the last possible minute, hoping the element of surprise would boost its impact.
It was hard to know which of the two starting centres in the 2015 Finals, Golden State’s Andrew Bogut or Cleveland’s Timofey Mozgov, had a rougher night Thursday in Game 4 at Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland.
Five things we learned from the Golden State Warriors' 103-82 Game 4 victory over the Cleveland Cavaliers in the 2015 Finals on Thursday at Quicken Loans Arena.
There are times, LeBron James acknowledged Thursday, when he forgets just who it is he’s working with in these 2015 NBA Finals.
CLEVELAND – Matthew Dellavedova made his first public appearance Wednesday with a paper cup in each hand, filled either with the beverage touted on the cups’ exteriors – Gatorade – or some other liquid to help keep him hydrated, a particular problem Tuesday night.
Had David Blatt known the first two games of the 2015 Finals would go into overtime, the Cleveland Cavaliers coach said Tuesday, he might have found more opportunities to give LeBron James a little rest.
Five things we learned from the Cleveland Cavaliers' 95-93 overtime victory over the Golden State Warriors in Game 2 of the 2015 Finals on Sunday at Oracle Arena.
Maybe it was only some California dreamin’, but NBA commissioner Adam Silver agreed Thursday with the head of the NBA players union that the next league’s collective bargaining agreement might be negotiated without the usual rancor or threat of a lockout.
Kyrie Irving tends to be a cranky patient, so the constant poking and prodding that comes with an ongoing injury -- not so much from the Cleveland Cavaliers' medical staff but from the public at large -- got old a round or two ago in these NBA playoffs.
A coaching legend overseas, the notion that Cleveland's 'rookie' coach has been in over his head during the playoffs rings hollow.
Despite success, management tired of clashes with coach.
LeBron James is back in the NBA Finals, and he's taking the Cleveland Cavaliers with him.
One of the most famous celebrity profiles in magazine history was entitled, "Frank Sinatra Has a Cold," a piece by Gay Talese for Esquire in 1966 that used Ol' Blue Eyes' bout with that most common of ailments as a side door into Sinatra's personality, moods and world.
Hawks upset over scrum that got Al Horford ejected, but Cavaliers' backup guard insists he did nothing wrong.
It’s better to be lucky than good, the saying goes. But once lucky, it helps to be smart if one hopes to get or stay good.
Disappointing playoff exit could signal end of Thibodeau era.
Ridiculous. Specious. Too soon, at the very least.
Maybe if Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers weren’t otherwise indisposed, LeBron James could have called on him to offer words of advice to Cleveland fans worried about, and NBA experts critical of, the Cavaliers’ unimpressive 5-5 start.
As the games came at them and their dominance kept them atop the Eastern Conference standings deep into the 2013-14 season, the Indiana Pacers learned the hard way they weren't in Kansas, er, Indianapolis anymore.
Rings still are the things, even if it didn’t necessarily seem that way in June.
