Sixers put up a good fight against Cavs again

CLEVELAND - For the second time this week, the 76ers hung with the Cleveland Cavaliers for the first half of basketball. Friday at Quicken Loans Arena they took a 50-49 lead into the break, after holding a 54-49 halftime lead on Monday at the Wells Fargo Center.

LeBron James awakened his sleepwalking team to start the second half in the rematch, not with a gentle nudge but a haymaker to the jaw, as he scored 18 points in the third quarter, though he played less than nine minutes, and led the Cavs to a 108-102 win to improve to 5-1. The Sixers, who shot 51.9 percent for the game, fell to 0-5.

James finished the game with 31 points and 13 assists. In the process, he became the 20th player in NBA history to make 9,000 career field goals.

On one play after a steal early in the second half, James had a full head of steam going to the basket from halfcourt, with only Jerami Grant to beat. Grant tried to wrap James with both arms about 10 feet from the basket, but LeBron ran through him as if he were a tackling dummy, deposited the layup and hit the ensuing foul shot.

Asked whether his players get a little wide-eyed when they face James, Sixers coach Brett Brown joked: "That's what I do. It's LeBron. There's lots of qualities that you look at them, and it's what-they-don't-know-they-don't-know types of stuff. But they play. Nobody is walking on eggshells.

"We do have guys who have played big games before. I admit that our fringe players, our bench players, haven't had the opportunities like Jahlil (Okafor) has had in big games or Nerlens (Noel) has had in big games."

James has played in many of them and dominated most. This probably didn't rank among his top 500 in level of importance, but when his team needs to play better and a win is there to be gotten, he can do it better than anyone.

"You get guilty of watching him," Okafor said. "As a team, we played solid. I think we're on the right path right now. They're hard to beat when he starts shooting threes. It was a great performance by him."

The Cavs' lead got to as high as 17 in that third, but when James went to the bench, the Sixers started to claw back. They cut it to 84-79 early in the fourth, but James made a hard drive from the left and banked in a 10-footer while getting fouled. His three-point play put pretty much let everyone know he wasn't losing this one, even though a short time later, he crumpled to the floor on another drive and had trouble putting pressure on his left leg at first. But after a few minutes, he walked slowly to the bench and returned to play after a timeout.

Okafor and Noel scored 18 each, with Noel hauling down 12 rebounds. Nik Stauskas added 14 points, while Isaiah Canaan scored 17 off the bench.

Richard Jefferson scored 17, Mo Williams 16 and Kevin Loved totaled 12 points and 14 rebounds for Cleveland.

This game, however, was all about LeBron James. Most nights, it is.

It appears Isaiah Canaan, who began the season starting at point guard, will no longer play that position. He played mostly at shooting guard against Cleveland.

The steady play of T.J. McConnell has thrust him into the starting lineup, and newly signed Phil Pressey will back him up. Canaan, the best shooter among the three, will get whatever minutes are available to him at shooting guard, with perhaps a few scattered minutes at the point.

"He will still have some point guard in him from time to time, but, right now, I don't see it immediately like that," Brown said at the team's morning shootaround at Quicken Loans Arena. "We'll probably go with Phillip and T.J. carrying that 48-minute load. Maybe Isaiah will come in if we really need to score.

"When we all sort of step back and say, 'What does he do,' he shoots. And so that counts for something when you have a post player like Jahlil. So now how do I find that quality? We especially miss it without (Robert) Covington (knee injury). I see (Canaan) coming in and playing, and I see it more now as a 'two.' What has to happen for that to more easily happen is you have to feel comfortable that the matchups aren't killing you. If they are rolling out 6-7 and 6-9 'two' and 'three' men, well then, maybe that isn't such a good idea."

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