Party Time on Friday Night as Cavs Beat Bulls

As the song goes, “Just got paid….Friday night…..on the floor, rockin’ to the beat”. I am sure that Johnny Kemp didn’t have the Cavaliers in mind when he wrote that song, but it seemed to be an appropriate one for Friday night’s 101-87 win over the visiting Chicago Bulls.

The Cavaliers players like to have fun during, before and after games, and their ringmaster is often LeBron James. On this night, you could see that the Cavs were primed for a little party on a Friday night, well before the game even started. One of the pregame rituals for the Cavaliers game day entertainment crew is to show the team on the arena video screens, as it exits the locker room, and the congregates in the hallway awaiting their jog onto the floor to their cheering fans. This time it was Darnell Jackson who was the first to emerge and he quickly broke into a little dance to a Michael Jackson song, with some cheering from stadium ringmaster, Ahmad. Rookie Danny Green was next to join in and the two had their own little dance-off before the hall filled with the rest of the team. At the head the pack as the countdown began and the fans rose to their feet, Daniel Gibson and Delonte West started their typical fake boxing match, and as it escalated, it became a fake wrestling match with most of the team eventually piling on, as Jamario Moon, playing the dreaded villain from outside the ring, fake-kicked the now crushed Gibson at the bottom of the pile. They all laughed and chest bumped as the group stood back up just in time to run onto the floor as the countdown clock struck :00. It was time to bring the fun to the floor.

However, for most of the first half, the Cavaliers gave themselves and their fans, little to dance and celebrate about as they bumbled their way to a 47-46 lead at the break. The half was marred with a number of silly turnovers and just relatively disorganized play. Fortunately for the Cavaliers, the second half was a complete turnaround from the first, as the Cavaliers rolled and seemed to come out with renewed adrenaline and focus. For the first time this season, the Cavaliers played a virtually error-free half, not turning the ball over one time in the half. By the end of the game, the Bulls were obviously just exhausted and felt the outcome of the game in little doubt, as with about eight minutes left and being down by 20, Chicago coach Vinny Del Negro began emptying his bench.

Even though the Cavs took care of their business in the second half, in sealing a win with less than half of the fourth quarter gone, it didn’t mean it was time for the fun to end. In one sequence in the second half, Jamario Moon (who has some of the best hops I have seen) had a highlight-film alley-oop dunk that brought the crowd and the bench to their feet, including LeBron James. As House of Pain’s, “Jump Around” blared in the arena into the timeout called by Chicago, James broke into a little dance outside the huddle with Danny Green. James and Green delighted the crowd who danced right along with them, for about a minute before getting back into the huddle. Did this mean that James was just going to play around the rest of the way? Hardly. LeBron re-entered the game and led the Cavaliers on a 21-4 run that put the game away.

Yes, it’s starting to look easy for the Cavaliers lately as they have rolled through two of the best teams in the West (Phoenix and Dallas), and now dismantled a team who shocked them by upsetting the Cavs at home earlier in the year. After a slow start, the Cavs are tied with the third-best record in the NBA at 14-5. They now have a week-long road trip with games in Milwaukee, Memphis and Houston. The party returns to The Q in a week. Let’s hope they take care of business on the road and give themselves and their fans more reason to party down on a Friday night, when they host Portland next Friday.

Tags: Daniel Gibson, Darnell Jackson, Delonte West, Jamario Moon, LeBron James