It was bound to happen. You knew that eventually the Cavs would choose to rest Kevin Love on the second night of a back-to-back, and the positive plus/minus numbers that Kev linchpinned for the starting lineup would come crashing back down from their lofty heights. Boy, did they ever. I often wondered how the Cavs could be putting up such great lineup numbers for their starters when most of the other lineups weren’t good, and when Collin Sexton and Darius Garland repeatedly failed the eye test. Monday night, we saw why. Kevin Love’s gravity, unselfishness, rebounding, passing, screens and general excellence were holding the starting unit together, and without him, a team that Cleveland embarrassed in New York just eight days earlier throttled the Cavs’ starters and owned the game.
Recap: New York 123, Cleveland 105 (or, Impotence in Sexland)
