Cavaliers Crush Raptors 116-105 in Game 1

The Cleveland Cavaliers defeated the Toronto Raptors, 116-105, in Game 1 of the
Eastern Conference semifinals at Quicken Loans Arena. The Cavaliers (1-0) showed
absolutely no rust following their first-round sweep over the Pacers, as they
opened up Monday’s contest on a 10-3 run and ended the first quarter with a
12-point lead. From there, they continued to poor it on, outscoring the Raptors
(0-1) by 10 points over the next two quarters and headed into the final period
with a safe 22-point lead. Toronto battled back in garbage time to make the
differential a little more respectable, but it was a wire-to-wire victory for
Cleveland to get a 1-0 lead. LeBron James was fantastic, shooting 13-of-23 from
the field en route to scoring a game-high 35 points and grabbing 10 rebounds.
Kyrie Irving also shined scoring 24 points and dishing out 10 assists, while
Tristan Thompson added his own double-double of 11 points and 14 rebounds. The
Cavaliers got it going from the outside, hitting an impressive 41.2 percent of
their threes in the winning effort. As for the Raptors, they just couldn’t keep
pace with the high-powered, efficient offense that Cleveland boasts and were
stuck playing from behind from the start. The did get a nice performance out of
Kyle Lowry, who recorded a double-double of 20 points and 11 assists, and DeMar
DeRozan finished with 19 points and seven rebounds. But, that’s likely not going
to be enough when you are playing one of the best offensive teams in the NBA,
especially when you consider that the two combined to average nearly 50 points
per game this season. The Raptors, however, have been in this situation plenty
of times before, as they have now lost 10 consecutive Game 1s. The two teams
will meet again for Game 2 on Wednesday in Cleveland.