The Cleveland Cavaliers advance to the Eastern Conference Semifinals after sweeping Indians Pacers in round one of the playoffs. The Cavs take on the Toronto Raptors in round two, starting with a home court advantage for games 1 and 2.
Scroll down for a recap of each game and stay with News 5 for the latest Cavs coverage.
GAME 1: CLEVELAND WINS
LeBron James resisted drinking some beer. He downed the Raptors again instead.
James grabbed a bottle of beer on the sideline while scoring 35 points, Kyrie Irving added 24 and the Cleveland Cavaliers picked up where they left off following a long layoff and throttled Toronto 116-105 on Monday night in the opener of their Eastern Conference semifinal.
Final Score: 116-105
The Cavs hadn't played since April 23, when they completed a four-game sweep of Indiana. But the defending champions didn't show signs of rust and were well-prepared to face the revenge-seeking Raptors, who lost to Cleveland in last year's conference finals.
"That was the mystery coming into the game, how we would come out?" James said. "Obviously you prepare, you want to come out and play well, but you never know after an eight-day layoff. But the energy was phenomenal."
Toronto dropped to 1-12 in playoff openers, and the Raptors got blown out in the playoffs for the fourth straight time in Cleveland.
GAME 2: CLEVELAND WINS
Unstoppable. Untouchable. Undefeated.
Back on the playoff stage, where he's starred so many times before, LeBron James is making things look easy.
Final Score: 125-103
James scored 39 points, hopped Kareem Abdul-Jabbar on the career playoff scoring list and pushed the Cleveland Cavaliers to a 125-103 blowout over the Toronto Raptors in Game 2 of their Eastern Conference semifinal series on Wednesday night.
And while he may not win another regular-season MVP, James is again showing that May and June belong to him.
"I'm feeling pretty good," he said, downplaying his break-neck start to this postseason. "Just blessed I'm able to make a few plays tonight to help us win another game."
Just like a year ago in the conference finals, the Cavs are up 2-0 on the Raptors, who had better figure some things out or this series will be over quickly. Toronto was blown out for the fifth straight time in Cleveland in the playoffs, losing each by an average of 24.2 points.
GAME 3: CLEVELAND WINS
LeBron James doesn’t prolong the inevitable. In Game 3 at Toronto he LeBron James scored 35 points, grabbed 8 rebounds, and dished out 7 assists to lead the Cavs to a win.
The last seven times that James’ teams have had a 3-0 lead in a playoff series, the matchup has ended in the most humane fashion — a sweep. He gets a chance at another Sunday, when Cleveland can oust Toronto and advance to the Eastern Conference finals.
Final Score: 115-94
That’s one of three Game 4s on Sunday’s NBA playoff slate: Boston and Washington continue their bruising series with the Celtics leading that East semifinal matchup 2-1, and San Antonio — which proved on Friday that it won’t buckle easily after losing Tony Parker for the season — will look to go up 3-1 in its West semifinal series against Houston.
Those Celtics-Wizards and Spurs-Rockets matchups look like they might last a while. The Cavaliers-Raptors one, not so much.
WATCH: Game 4 airs on News 5 Sunday, with coverage starting at 2:30 pm!
GAME 4: CLEVELAND WINS
In Game 4, the Cavs sweeped the Raptors, ending the round two playoffs with four straight wins. In the fourth quarter, Kyrie Irving stepped up and scored 11 straights points. The Cavs are the first team to start 8-0 in the finals.
Kyle Korver scored 18 points to help the Cavaliers become the first team to win eight straight playoff games the year following a title, and the first team to win eight straight in consecutive postseasons.
They finished off the Raptors about an hour before Game 4 between the Celtics and Wizards tipped off in Washington.
James added nine rebounds and six assists. Irving had nine assists.
That series won't end until Wednesday night at the earliest, and could run until Monday night, meaning the Cavaliers will have plenty of time to rest before the Eastern Conference Finals.
Next up: Eastern Conference Finals.#DefendTheLand pic.twitter.com/c0KzJSsPbF
— Cleveland Cavaliers (@cavs) May 7, 2017
