NBA -- Battle royale between best player vs best team
By Reylan Loberternos
PhilBoxing.com
Wed, 11 Mar 2015
FOLSOM, California - Mark your calendars, folks. March 12, 2015 (March 13 Manila time) is a special day for hoops fans as the defending champions San Antonio Spurs defend their home floor against LeBron James and the visiting Cleveland Cavaliers at the AT&T Center.
This is a rematch of their November 19, 2014 squeaker, one that didn't disappoint, thanks to a 92-90 escape that the Spurs pulled on the road at the Q Arena in Cleveland .
Tim Duncan powered the Spurs in that encounter with an impressive statline of 19 pts, 10 rebs, 3 asts, 2 stls and 2 blks to beat Cleveland for the 10th straight time, while Boris Diaw was equally impressive with 19 pts, 6 rebs, 7 asts, 3 stls, and 1 blk of his own.
On the other hand, 4-time league MVP LeBron James was held to only 15 points, 6 rebounds, 9 assists, 1 stl, and 1 blk to go along with his team high 5 TOs. Kawhi Leonard hounded LeBron all night long, limiting him to 3 for 11 field goal shooting, including 0 for 3 in the second half, when the reigning Finals MVP was his primary defender.
The Cavs will be facing basically the same Spurs team, whereas the defending champions will have to deal with a squad reinforced by acquisitions before the trade deadline in big men Timofey Mosgov and Kendrick Perkins and former New York Knicks wingmen JR Smith and Iman Shumpert. Brazilian center Anderson Varejao, who compiled game high 23 points on an 11 for 16 field goal shooting and game high 11 rebounds to go along with 2 blocks for the Cavs in their first encounter with the Spurs this season, will be out of commission for this particular game, as he underwent a surgery early this year that is expected to sideline him for 6 to 8 weeks.
All things considered, this should shape up as another good one,
This could very well be a preview to this year's NBA Finals, a rematch of the 2007 battle which the Spurs easily took over the young and inexperienced Cavs.
But LeBron has grown so much since and has become a two-tine NBA champion.
It's Big 3 --- LeBron, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love --- versus Big 3 -- Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili.
Hard to pick a winner in this easy, but it's easy to predict another must-see TV.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Reylan Loberternos.
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