Cavaliers 126, Knicks 109: Scenes from the Ricky Rubio Game

Ricky Rubio went on an all-time heater, destroying the Knicks from beyond the arc with eight three-pointers en route to a career-high 37 points. The starting lineup played pathetic basketball, acting like this Cavs team was the same scrub squad from last season instead of a 6-4 club. Well guess who is 6-4 now? The Knicks, that’s who. The Cavs are 7-4, and look like yet another legit competitor in a disturbingly deep Eastern Conference.

RJ Barrett (8 points on 3-13 shooting) had his worst game of the season. More disturbing than all the misses, however, was that this was the first game this season during which RJ seemed to allow a bad shooting performance to affect his all-around game. I didn’t like it.

Nor did I like the play of the starting frontcourt. Mitchell Robinson looked slow and disinterested as he was demolished by the talented Cavs frontline of Jarrett Allen and rookie Evan Mobley. Julius Randle played embarrassing defense yet again, but Tom Thibodeau reinserted him for some reason in the fourth quarter after the bench, led by Obi Toppin and Immanuel Quickley, sort of got the Knicks back into the game.

Recap to come. This sucked.