Two streaks continue – and neither are good for the Hawks.
The Cavaliers have now won nine straight playoff and eight straight overall games against the Hawks.
The Cavaliers’ latest victory over the Hawks was a 104-93 win Monday night in Game 1 of their best-of-seven Eastern Conference semifinal series at Quicken Loans Arena.
The Hawks erased an 18-point second-half deficit but still came up on the losing end after another late-game scoring drought. The Cavs ended the game on a 17-5 run after the Hawks took a one-point lead with 4:27 remaining. The Hawks managed just one basket after their final lead, a Lamar Patterson 3-pointer with 30 seconds left.
“It doesn’t matter,” Paul Millsap said when asked whether he felt the Cavaliers won or the Hawks lost the game. “We could have made shots that could have put us up. We tied the game and had opportunities to make the game go our way and put it in our favor.”
LeBron James led the Cavaliers with 25 points. Kyrie Irving added 21 points and Tristan Thompson had 14 rebounds, seven offensive and seven defensive.
Dennis Schroder led the Hawks with a game-high and career playoff-high 27 points. Millsap had 17 points and 13 rebounds and Kent Bazemore had 16 points and 12 rebounds.
The Hawks were swept in their previous two playoff series against the Cavaliers, the 2015 Eastern Conference finals and the 2009 semifinals. They lost all three regular-season games against the Cavaliers.
Al Horford gave the Hawks an 88-87 lead with a basket with 4:27 remaining. The Hawks wouldn’t score for 2:59 as the Cavaliers went on a 10-0 run. The finally scored on a pair of Millsap free throws with 1:28 left. By then, they trailed 97-88.
J.R. Smith drilled a 3-pointer, Kevin Love made two of three free throws, James converted a three-point play and Love hit two more free throws in the 10-0 Cavaliers’ run.
After a Schroder turnover, the Cavaliers got offensive rebounds on two straight misses. On the third possession James completed the three-point play with 2:09 remaining for a 95-88 lead.
Since the game was tied at 86-86, the Hawks finished the game 2 of 10 from the field with four turnovers.
“I think we can play better,” Hawks coach Mike Budenholzer said. “Obviously, Dennis had a great game for us but overall the whole group we can play better. Defensively we had some possessions where we gave ourselves a chance we just couldn’t come up with a couple of rebounds late when it was tied (86-86). We get a couple more of those rebounds and execute on the other end. For a Game 1, we’ll learn a lot and we’ll be better going forward on both ends.”
The Cavaliers led by as many as 18 points, 72-54, in the third quarter of a game they hadn’t trailed. The Hawks ended the third on a 16-2 run to cut their deficit to just four points, 74-70, headed to the final quarter. Four of their five baskets during the run were 3-pointers.
The Hawks weren’t done.
The run continued into the fourth quarter and grew to 26-7 streak, including 10 straight points with a Horford basket that gave the Hawks their first lead of the game, 80-79, with eight minutes remaining.
It set up a back-and-forth contest before the Cavaliers’ decisive run.
The Cavaliers took a 51-41 lead into intermission after leading by as many as 13 points in the first half. They did so as they shot 44.4 percent (20 of 45) from the field and 42.9 percent (9 of 21) from 3-point range. At one point, the Cavaliers were 9 of 17 from long range. The Hawks, in stark contrast, shot 29.8 percent (14 of 47) from the field and 27.8 percent (5 of 18) from 3-point range.
Schroder had 12 and Bazemore had 11 first-half points, including the Hawks’ first eight points. Horford (0 of 6) and Kyle Korver (0 of 1) were held scoreless through two periods.
The Hawks were wary of putting too much effort to stop James that they left other shooters open. The Cavaliers delivered with 15 3-pointers.
“We had so many opportunities there in the last four minutes,” Bazemore said. “Myself, I’ve got to be a lot better. I missed a ton of bunnies, turnover, inadvertent foul on Kevin Love in the corner. It’s growing pains. … We’ll be back.”
Game 2 is Wednesday night in Cleveland.
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