Cavs Beat Lakers Again, And There Is A New King In Town

The rebuild in Cleveland has reached new levels. LeBron James came into Cleveland, wasn’t the best player on the court, and had to listen to “MVP” chants being rained down on Donovan Mitchell. 

New King On The Block

The year is 2022 and the city of Cleveland now belongs to Donovan Mitchell. The passing of the torch from LeBron controlling every part of this organization to a new young future is finally here. 

Last night, Mitchell was out of his mind. The superstar from Elmsford, New York dropped an unreal stat line of 43 points, five assists, six rebounds, and four steals. But, it wasn’t just the stats for Mitchell. 

Every other play was a highlight reel dunk that energized the fans in Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse. His defense was elite, and not just on the ball. His effort to move on rotations is an absolute tone-setter for this team. 

The Cavs' defense missed a few rotations onto Thomas Bryant, but as a whole, they were causing havoc for LeBron and Russell Westbrook forcing them into seven of the Lakers' 16 turnovers.

The best part of the night? With just over three minutes to play, Mitchell hit a step-back three to ice the game and told the Lakers to “go home”... with some other expletives riddled in there as well.

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Bench Issues

Despite the positives that came from last night, the bench had another poor performance. They shot an abysmal 34 percent from the field last night and finished -25 as a whole. They need to get healthy. 

Kevin Love has been borderline unplayable since the hairline fracture in his hand. If he can’t play through it, I’d rather see him sit out and get healthy instead of whatever he’s been doing. 

Not only him, but the Cavs miss Dean Wade badly. Lamar Stevens was great on LeBron in the second half defensively, but he looked very rough on the other side of the ball. I like that he’s willing to shoot the open corner three, but too many times he would take one with too much time on the shot clock. Swing the ball around and let someone with a more consistent jumper try and get an open look.

Wade was shooting nearly 50 percent on corner threes before his injuries, and this team desperately needs his scoring back.

However, I’m willing to look past any flaws of this Cavs team when they beat LeBron James in Cleveland. They ran well in transition, played very hard defense, and Donovan Mitchell played like an MVP. What more can you ask for?