The Brooklyn Nets make their 1st of 2 visits to Quicken Loans Arena Wednesday night to face the Cleveland Cavaliers. Here’s how to watch the action.
The Brooklyn Nets look to get back to the .500 mark and pick up their first win of the season Wednesday night when they visit the winless Cleveland Cavaliers, who are stumbling out of the gate after the departure of free agent LeBron James over the offseason.
Cleveland (0-3) is the four-time defending Eastern Conference champions, but the Cavaliers missed the playoffs in each of the last four seasons they played without James (2010-14).
Brooklyn (1-2) will be playing the second of three consecutive games on the road. The Nets started the trip with a 132-112 loss to the Indiana Pacers on Saturday.
Caris LeVert and Joe Harris led the Nets with 19 points each in a game that got away from them in the second half, in part because of their 20 turnovers. Ed Davis grabbed eight rebounds and had two blocked shots for Brooklyn, while D’Angelo Russell finished with seven assists.
Cleveland started the season with consecutive road losses before they were thumped by the Atlanta Hawks in their home opener 133-111 on Sunday.
In that game, the Cavaliers committed a season-high 18 turnovers and surrendered 22 3-pointers to the Hawks — the most the team has allowed since the NBA added the 3-point shot for the 1979-80 season.
Atlanta’s 47 attempts from deep were the second-most allowed by the Cavs. The Houston Rockets fired 51 times from behind the arc in a 120-88 win in Cleveland on Feb. 3.
Jordan Clarkson scored 19 points off the bench to lead Cleveland in the loss to Atlanta. Kevin Love finished with 16 points and 17 rebounds. Cedi Osman and Larry Nance each had four assists.
Turnovers have been the bane of the Nets this season as they had their second consecutive game with at least 20 turnovers Saturday at Indiana and have averaged a league-worst 20.3 turnovers per game so far this season.
Since the Nets joined the NBA in 1976, Cleveland leads the all-time series between the teams 101-75, even though the Nets won 16 consecutive games in the series from Feb. 18, 1981 through Dec. 6, 1983.
The Cavaliers have won the last three meetings between the teams and have won 10 in a row against Brooklyn at home.
Since the move to Brooklyn in 2012, the Nets are 8-14 against Cleveland, but have the highest-scoring single game in the series, posting a 140-125 win as the New Jersey Nets in Richfield, Ohio, on March 13, 1981.
The most points by a Nets player in the series came on Dec. 22, 2004, when Richard Jefferson — who will be making his debut as a game analyst on YES Network Wednesday night — dropped in 42 points, including the game-winning layup with 0.8 second remaining, in a 92-90 New Jersey win at Continental Airlines Arena in East Rutherford, N.J.
Two Cleveland players have scored 42 points against the Nets. Mike Mitchell had 42 in 110-108 loss to the Nets at Rutgers Athletic Center on Feb. 18, 1981, and LeBron James matched that total in a 104-99 loss to New Jersey at the Izod Center in East Rutherford on March 12, 2008.
*-Historical research courtesy of Basketball-Reference.com.
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Here is how to get connected to Wednesday night’s matchup between the Brooklyn Nets and Cleveland Cavaliers.
Brooklyn Nets at Cleveland Cavaliers, 7 p.m. Eastern
Quicken Loans Arena, Cleveland
TV: YES Network (Ian Eagle, Richard Jefferson)
Live stream: NBA League Pass
The skinny
Season series: First meeting (Cavaliers won series last season, 3-1)
Records: Brooklyn (1-2), Cleveland (0-3)
Scoring: BKN 106.3 (25th in NBA), CLE 112.7 (18th in NBA)
Defense: BKN 111.3 (16th), CLE 126.7 (28th)
Off. Rating: BKN 107.9 (23rd), CLE 109.1 (18th)
Def. Rating: BKN 115.0 (23rd), 122.7 (30th)
Pace: BKN 98.5 (28th), CLE 103.2 (9th)
Shooting: BKN 48.6% (7th), CLE 45.1% (19th)
3-point: BKN 35.1% (18th), CLE 36.2% (15th)
Opponent shooting: BKN 45.9% (16th), CLE 49.5% (26th)
Opponent 3-point: BKN 40.8% (27th), CLE 43.8% (29th)
Injuries
Brooklyn: OUT–DeMarre Carroll (right ankle surgery), Treveon Graham (strained left hamstring), Rodions Kurucs (sprained left ankle)
Cleveland: none
Last meeting
March 25, 2018, at Brooklyn: LeBron James finished with 37 points, 10 rebounds and eight assists as the Cavaliers came from behind to beat the Brooklyn Nets at Barclays Center, 121-114.
Kevin Love added 20 points and 15 boards for Cleveland and Tristan Thompson grabbed 10 rebounds in 15 minutes off the bench.
Joe Harris scored a career-high 30 points off the bench to lead Brooklyn, going 11-for-14 overall and hitting 6-of-7 from deep. He also had seven rebounds. Rondae Hollis-Jefferson added 15 points and seven rebounds and Caris LeVert had seven assists off the bench.
The Nets led 89-87 entering the fourth quarter and pushed the lead to five on a basket by Dante Cunningham early in the period. Cleveland took its first lead of the second half when Rodney Hood hit a mid-range jumper to cap a 7-0 run by the Cavs.
George Hill‘s layup with 5:58 gave the Cavaliers the lead for good with 5:58 to go and his short jumper with 1:44 remaining put Cleveland up 10.
What’s next?
Brooklyn: at New Orleans, Friday; vs. Golden State, Sunday; at New York, Monday
Cleveland: at Detroit, Thursday; vs. Indiana, Saturday; vs. Atlanta, Tuesday