CLEVELAND — LeBron James slowed down while jogging back to the locker room after Game 2 of the Eastern Conference finals.
He had to pause to embrace former Lakers legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar after leading the Cavaliers to a 108-89 win against the Raptors.
“What he did for the game, the championship runs that he had with the ‘Showtime’ Lakers and him being the all-time leading scorer in NBA history and so on and so on and so on,” James said. “It’s just respect.”
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And a sense of history repeating itself. James is doing in the Eastern Conference what Abdul-Jabbar and running mate Magic Johnson used to do in the Western Conference throughout the 1980s.
Total domination. These Cavaliers are taking a lot of thirtysomething basketball fans back to 1980s with their dominance of the Eastern Conference playoffs. The artistry of the ball movement, the blowouts and big smiles are something Abdul-Jabbar can appreciate. It has a “Showtime” feel to it, and there are some interesting parallels.
We’re not saying these Cavaliers would beat the “Showtime” Lakers, but it’s safe to say no team — and maybe no player — is having more fun right now.
That starts with James. He dished out six assists in the first quarter alone. He launched a three-quarter court shot at the end of the first half and nearly beat it to the hoop before leaping up to hang on the rim for about five seconds. Had that shot gone down, nobody at Quicken Loans Arena would’ve blinked.
That’s how well James — who is shooting 69.2 percent the last two games — and the Cavaliers are playing against the Raptors. Cleveland is 10-0 in this year's playoff run and dating back to last season has won 17 straight in the Eastern Conference playoffs. Coach Tyronn Lue isn’t downplaying that success because of the perception of the competition.
“Whether they call the East weak or not, we've got to beat these teams,” Lue said. “These teams have beaten a lot of West Coast teams throughout the regular season, so I don't care what they say.”
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Why would he? The Cavaliers have James, who between Miami and Cleveland could lead an Eastern Conference team to the NBA Finals for the sixth straight season. In those six seasons, James-led teams are 70-18 in the Eastern Conference playoffs.
Kareem and Magic did the same thing from 1982-89 by winning seven of eight appearances in the Western Conference finals. Los Angeles compiled a 79-21 record in the Western Conference playoffs in those eight years, including a 50-9 record in the first two rounds.
Those wins came against a bunch of not-that-memorable teams, including the Spurs, Suns, Nuggets, Sonics and Mavericks. The Rockets beat the Lakers in the 1985-86 conference finals with the help of Hakeem Olajuwon and Ralph Sampson. The 1987-88 Mavericks were the only team to take the Lakers to seven games in the conference finals.
The lesson? It took a special team to beat the Lakers. You knew Kareem and Magic would lead the Lakers to the NBA Finals. The same will be said about the Cavaliers for as long as James is there.
Indiana took back-to-back swings at James with the Heat and lost. The Bulls and Celtics tried against Miami. Atlanta tried against Cleveland. Now it’s Toronto’s turn. Aside from the Celtics, did anybody seriously think a LeBron-led team was going to lose in this round? The last — and only time — it happened was 2008-09 against the Orlando Magic.
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This time, the Cavaliers are perfect in the postseason and could be on the verge of one of the greatest playoff runs in NBA history, even if it comes with a different way of looking at it.
“I don't think it feels like a streak,” James said. “I think it feels like we won one game. We won the next game, and how do we prepare and be better the following game. We've taken one step at a time. We haven't overlooked any steps along this process thus far, and I think that's part of the reason we're in this position today.”
That’s a lesson James could learn from Abdul-Jabbar, who was part of a Lakers team that breezed through the Western Conference playoffs in 1988-89 before getting swept by the Pistons. Abdul-Jabbar would retire after that season. James was 4 years old at the time.
In the present, James lived out a night full of milestones. He notched his 15th postseason triple double with 23 points, 11 rebounds and 11 assists, which trails only Johnson, who had 30. James moved into fourth place on the all-time postseason scoring list with 5,255 career points, passing Shaquille O’Neal.
James didn’t focus on that. He slowed down, embraced a legend and made it that much easier to appreciate history as it repeats itself.
“It just always takes me back to my childhood,” James said of those milestones. “Watching so many of the greats playing basketball and saying I wish I could be a part of that or at times saying there's no way I could be a part of such a great league, there's no way."
