Western Conference champs, the Golden State Warriors, will take on Eastern Conference champs, the Cleveland Cavaliers, in game one of a best of seven series in the NBA Finals on Thursday, June, 4, 2015 at Oracle Arena in Oakland, California.
Both teams were predicted by many experts to make the finals at the beginning of the postseason. The Warriors finished with the NBA’s best record of 67-15 with their star player Stephen Curry being awarded with the MVP award this year. The Cleveland Cavaliers finished second in the Eastern conference with a 53-29 record.
Both teams had no problem getting to the big game, but the Cavaliers ran into a different problem that might affect them throughout this series – a season-ending shoulder injury to Cavs forward Kevin Love in the first round of the playoffs against the Boston Celtics.
The Cavs acquired Love in a three team deal including the Minnesota Timberwolves and Philadelphia Sixers. The Timberwolves got first overall draft pick Andrew Wiggins and Anthony Bennett from the Cavs, forward Thaddeus Young from the Sixers and a $6.3 million trade exception. The Sixers acquired a 2015 first-round draft choice, guard Alexey Shved and forward Luc Richard Mbah, a Moute from Minnesota.
I think that the Warriors will win the series in seven games for a couple of reasons. First off, Love is not playing the entire series. He is a fantastic shooter and scorer, plays real physical basketball, and is really hard to defend. If he was healthy, this would definitely be a whole different series.
Second of all, Cavs star point guard Kyrie Irving hurt his foot and is very limited in what he can do and how long he can play. Irving has an unbelievable vision to find other players and has great versatility.
Another reason is that the Warriors have the 2015 MVP in Curry. In the regular season, Curry averaged 23.8 points per game, along with 7.7 assists per game. In the post season this year, Curry is averaging 29.2 points per game, along with 6.4 assists per game.
Freshman Ethan Biscette said, “Watching Curry this season amazed me. His ability to shoot and his ball-handling skills were unbelievable. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Curry and his teammate Klay Thompson earned the nickname Splash Bros because of their great ability to shoot. Many people think they are the best duo in all of basketball history.
A last reason is that the Warriors have home court advantage. They lost only one game at home in the playoffs and only three all season.
Senior Joe Infuso said, “The Warriors are lights out at home; they just refuse to lose there. They do everything better at home than they do on the road.”
People may believe that the Cavs will win because of the Finals experience some players have and that lack of experience on the Warriors side. To a lot of people, Finals experience is everything. A lot of players and coaches say that playing in the finals is way different than playing in any other game during the regular season or the post season.
Five players have Finals experience on the Cavs: Mike Miller, James Jones, Shawn Marion, Kendrick Perkins and Lebron James.
James went to the Finals with the Cavs in 2007, but got swept by the San Antonio Spurs. He also played in four straight Finals with the Miami Heat in the past four years, winning in 2012 and ’13, but losing in ’14 and ’15.
Who do you think will win it all?