In the premiere of LeBron's new "Big Three," the New York Knicks upstaged the work-in-progress trio, and instead left Quicken Loans Arena by pulling out a spoiler on the road. In his (re)debut James scored 17 points while turning the ball over eight times. His failure to keep the rock out of New York's hands tied his career high for turnovers in a regulation contest.
Kyrie Irving had a solid night with 22 points and seven assists, but Cleveland's biggest star was Kevin Love who finished with a double-double (which is standard) by collecting 19 points alongside 14 boards. Love also had this beautiful outlet pass that led to LeBron's first field goal in his second Cleveland-go-round:
Love, later added another outlet pass that not only led to another easy score for LeBron, but also gave us this Carmelo Anthony struggle face that's much more suitable for a fat kid in gym class than it is for a 7-time NBA All Star:
Still, instead of building a narrative around the Cavs disappointing, we could just as easily point out all the surprise positives that the Knicks had for the night. Anthony (though noticeably winded) led all scorers with 25 points whilst also knocking down a dagger over LeBron with 26 seconds left.
On top of that, the Knicks also got 41 points from their bench (as compared to the Cavs lowly 12). The win for New York gave Derek Fisher his first career 'W' in addition to inevitably giving us way too much analysis over a single regular season loss.
Remember, that's all it is.
[via YouTube, Instagram]
