LeBron, Cavs Facing Another Finals Loss Unless Irving and Love Decide to Grow Up

OAKLAND, Calif. — If you want to make this series a broader referendum on LeBron James because he’ll drop to 2-5 in NBA Finals if he loses, let’s shift the blame game somewhere more legitimate.

There are two built-in, wholly viable excuses for James not to win: Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love.

They weren’t winners before they joined up with James.

If they don’t win with him, it says far more about them than about him.

Game 1 Thursday night was a landmark moment in the careers of Irving and Love, whose injury absences from the 2015 NBA Finals were the convenient excuse for the Cleveland Cavaliers’ failure.

Irving and Love made it all the way back to the final round. It took a lot of hard rehabilitation and real dedication, no doubt.

Yet the way they played in the Cavs’ 104-89 loss to the Golden State Warriors was far too predictable.

They like to score. They love their stats.

Yet do they still not understand what it takes to make their teammates—and LeBron’s team—better?

It’s not about their numbers; it’s about all the little things they do to put their teammates in positions to succeed.

It’s possible Irving and Love just aren’t capable of that higher learning, no matter how much James has tried to teach them.

That’s the beauty of James’ game: He can and will get his points, usually with the sweetener of doing it efficiently, and he will set up the guys around him for success in a multitude of ways.

“He’s most dangerous as a facilitator,” Golden State’s Draymond Green said on the eve of these Finals.

The Warriors tried to make James a scorer in the Finals last year because the depleted supporting cast meant no one else could create.

The fact that the Warriors are still so committed to making James a scorer now is a testament to how little faith they have in either Irving or Love doing what it takes to meld the Cavaliers into a cohesive unit.

And it showed Thursday night.

Cleveland coach Tyronn Lue …

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