Cavaliers drubbed by Knicks

  The Cleveland Cavaliers were underdogs entering game three of their Eastern Conference series in New York against the homestanding Knicks and they promptly showed why as the New York Knicks swamped the Cavaliers 99-79 to give the Knicks a two-to-one lead in the series.

Donovan Mitchell led a listless Cleveland offense with twenty-two points.

Game four returns to the World's Most Famous Arena for a Sunday tussle.

Swashbucklings

1) Simply an awful shooting night for the Cavaliers, who shot thirty-eight percent from the floor and a terrible seven of thirty-three from beyond the three-point arc.

Not sure how I can make that sound worse but it seemed even worse if you were watching the game.

2) Darius Garland was unable to approach his terrific stats from game two and his shooting in game three was downright brutal as Garland connected only four times from twenty-one shots to finish with an anemic ten-point evening.

Cleveland will need a far better performance from Garland in game four in order to tie the series.

3) Cleveland decided to start Caris LeVert after his strong game two and LeVert finished with seventeen points after starting in place of Isaac Okoro.

4) Okoro did see more court time than in his two minutes in game two, scoring seven points and making both of his shots in twelve minutes of mostly garbage time.

Suddenly, I'm starting to wonder about Okoro's long-term role in Cleveland.

5) Jarrett Allen hit all of his shots and you'd think reading that stat that Allen had a big game.

Allen only shot three times, finished with six points, and five rebounds, and disappeared for most of the game in a disappointing evening.

Allen wasn't alone in a rough night but other than Darius Garland, he might have been the most glaring disappointment.

6) Issac Okoro's seven points equaled the remaining output from the bench and in a blowout, you would think someone would have hit a few shots to post a good stat line.

7) Game four is must win for Cleveland as I just don't think the talent difference is vast enough to win the final three games of the series.

But I think game four is very possible to win for the Cavaliers.

Game three was the return of playoff basketball to New York after a long absence and the crowd was sky-high for the game.

I'm not sure the Knicks or the crows can match that intensity for game four and that might give Cleveland just enough of an edge to even the series and regain home court advantage.