Over the final 12 minutes, James hit nine of his 10 shot attempts and outscored the Cavs by himself, 21-19.
“Pretty awesome,” Lakers coach Frank Vogel said. “The shot-making was just ridiculous. Just one of those nights for the ages for him.” - Fedor
This was a very, very positive game for the Cavaliers when you consider they were down by three points with two minutes left despite:
1. Playing the team with the best record in the NBA that came in 9-0 on the road.
2. Playing their third game in four nights and on the second night of a back-to-back while the Lakers had a day off coming in.
3. Not having Love and Nance, our two best power forwards while having to play against the best power forward in the world.
4. The referees giving the Lakers so many breaks that Bickerstaff lost his voice screaming at them and after the game said the Cavs had to beat "the Lakers plus", referring to the refs.
5. LeBron having a "night for the ages", as Vogel described it. LeBron is 36 but if he had that game at 26 it still might have been his best game of the year. I mean, 46 points on 26 shots not to mention 8 assists? He either scored or assisted on 62-65 points in 38 minutes (depending on how many assists were 3-pointers).
One of LeBron's 3's was released with both feet inside the "C" at center court.
By the way, LeBron scored more than 46 points 18 times in his 11 years with the Cavaliers, or about one and one-half times per season. Yeah, this was not "LeBron being LeBron". This was a rare performance even for him.
Fortunately the rest of the Lakers were ice cold going 3-for-21 on 3's which kept the Cavs in the game, along with some great 3-point shooting from Cedi and Drummond's huge game. We needed Sexton to do better than 6-for-17 but he had to alter some shots to compensate for the Lakers' height. He also had four turnovers to lead the team.