They could be pretty soon. Fedor had this:
On the second night of a back-to-back, their third game in four nights, at the end of a three-city road trip, down a trio of regulars -- Donovan Mitchell (strained groin), Ricky Rubio (knee injury maintenance), Kevin Love (lower back spasms) -- could the Cavs summon the energy to finish the road trip on a high note ahead of their flight back home?
Not this time. Not this season...Empty tank. Heavy legs. Big minutes. Too much Gilgeous-Alexander.
That sums it up. A tired Cavs team missing two key players, including their KEY player, played the Thunder even for three quarters but when JBB needed to give Allen and Garland a break to start the 4th it was over.
The first half was great. They had 19 assists to 3 turnovers and led 54-47 despite going just 3-for-16 on 3's. Even if they shot 6-for-16 (37.5%) in the first half they would have been up by 16 points at halftime. But they ran out of gas in the second half.
This won't happen in the playoffs because they won't play three games in four nights in three different cities and none of them at home, nor will they sit Rubio down because there won't be any back-to-backs. Once they get Mitchell back and Rubio and Wade fully up to speed while never having to travel west of Milwaukee this team will be way better than they were last night.