Toronto (0-1) at Cleveland (1-0)
When: Thursday, May 19th 2016
Where: Quicken Loans Arena, Cleveland, OH
Time: 8:35 ET | TV: ESPN
The Cleveland Cavaliers look to stay unbeaten this postseason when they host the Toronto Raptors in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals on Thursday night. Cleveland improved to 9-0 in this year’s playoffs after a resounding 115-84 Game 1 victory – the largest margin of victory in Cavaliers postseason history. LeBron James, who scored 24 points on 11-of-13 shooting, is highly motivated to keep things rolling. “We have a goal, and our goal was not nine wins,” James told reporters. “It’s just not my focus. I’ve won nine games in the postseason before, won 14 games in the postseason before. “It’s not my goal, and as the leader of this team, I’m going to continue to make sure that these guys understand what our goal is.” Kyrie Irving had a great Game 1 with 27 points on 11-of-17 shooting. The Cavaliers made just seven 3-pointers in Game 1 after averaging 19.3 per contest in a four-game sweep of the Atlanta Hawks last round.
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The Raptors were dominated on the boards 45-23 without center Jonas Valanciunas (ankle) – who is likely to miss Game 2 as well. Backup center Bismack Biyombo had 12 points on 5-of-5 shooting, but pulled down only 4 rebounds after averaging 14.5 in the final two games of the second round. Point guard Kyle Lowry appeared to be turning his poor postseason around with outings of 36 and 35 to close the Miami series but he was terrible in Game 1 with just eight points on 4-of-14 shooting – including missing all seven 3-point attempts. DeMarre Carroll had just two points on Tuesday, marking the eighth time he has been in single digits in 15 games this postseason.
Toronto looked completely overmatched in Game 1 and will not compete in this series. I can see Cleveland winning all of these games by double-digits except maybe one in Toronto. I’ll lay the points with the Cavs again.
Pick: Cavaliers -12
