Cleveland battled back,however,and outscored Washington 20-8 down the stretch and it was Cleveland starting their season 1-0 with a 94-84 victory at the Q.
Kyrie Irving led Cleveland with 29 points with Dion Waiters contributing 17 points in his pro debut,but the most impressive stat of the night goes to the "Wild Thing" Anderson Varejao,who ripped down 23 rebounds during the night. The Cavaliers will host Chicago Friday night.
Swashbucklings
1) If there was some reason to hope for the future,they showed tonight.
Kyrie Irving was clearly the best player on the floor and broke down every player that Washington attempted to guard him with.
Granted,the Wizards were missing John Wall and that enabled Irving to rest a bit on the defensive end of the floor,but again Irving was dominant as he shot 11 for 20 from the floor to lead Cleveland in points...
2) Dion Waiters was solid in his first game with 17 points,two third pointers and a rousing dunk late in the game.
Waiters showed that the talent is there to succeed,but I hope that he doesn't fall in love with the three pointer.
Something makes me think that Waiters is going to launch plenty of threes this season...
3) Anderson Varejao-23 boards,9 points and 9 assists on the evening,just missing a triple double.
The 23 rebounds were a career high and that came with missing some time in the first half after catching an elbow from Tristan Thompson.
Without that trip to the locker room,Varejao gets his triple double.
4) Speaking of Tristan Thompson-12 points,10 rebounds and used the dunk as a high percentage shot.
Those are the types of numbers that the Cavaliers hope to see every night and maybe the team could afford to move Anderson Varejao in the right deal.
5) Tyler Zeller looked OK in fifteen minutes of play.
I hope that Byron Scott experiments with Zeller and Tristan Thompson on the floor at the same time as the season goes on...
6) Loved the Gold uniforms!
Only thing that I would change is that I would use Cavaliers instead of the listed Cavs,but I thought they looked quite sharp.
7) Before getting too excited about this win,keep in mind that Washington was without their two best players in John Wall and Nene'. That would be the equivalent of Cleveland playing without Kyrie Irving and Anderson Varejao,so I'll temper some of the enthusiasm.
8) Loved the defense from the Cavaliers!
With the exception of the first portion of the fourth period,Cleveland's defense kept Washington from getting (and making) shots and generally harassed the Wizard guards to death.
Washington finished with a 35 percent shooting percentage from the floor,so that goes a long way to proving my point...
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