Little-known Bucks rookie dunks on LeBron and Kyrie in same game
The recent controversy over the Cleveland Cavaliers’ decision to not even have LeBron James, Kyrie Irving, and Kevin Love travel to a road game rested on one basic principle — that this championship-winning trio is very fun to watch. Fans plan entire trips around watching these stars play because they have the potential to do things we have never seen before. LeBron still has the right to rest every once in a while, but it’s understandable why fans in opposing arenas would be upset.
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Milwaukee Bucks fans who attended Tuesday’s home game against the Cavs did in fact see LeBron and Kyrie involved in two fantastic highlights. However, the perpetrator of the plays was not one of these stars — it was little-known Bucks rookie guard Malcolm Brogdon, the 36th pick in last June’s draft.
His first big dunk came late in the first quarter, when Brogdon took Irving off the dribble and finished on him at the rim:
Yet that was mere prelude to this third-quarter slam around LeBron’s outstretched hand:
Brogdon may be familiar to anyone who watched him at Virginia, where he was the 2016 ACC Player of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year. He’s also been one of the best rookies in an admittedly poor class, giving the Bucks steady production and a shooting threat off the bench. These dunks are going to make him much more well known.
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Of course, it wasn’t such a bad night for LeBron and the Cavs. First, James passed Moses Malone for the No. 8 spot on the NBA’s all-time scoring list. Fittingly, he used a putback to move ahead of the NBA’s all-time leader in offensive rebounds:
That early bucket started a big night for LeBron, who finished with 34 points (12-of-25 FG), 12 rebounds, and seven assists. It looked for a time that this performance would be part of a comfortable win for Cleveland, but Milwaukee erased an 18-point second-quarter lead to pull ahead soon after halftime. The teams stayed tight from there on before heading to overtime, where James hit a long go-ahead three to put the Cavs up for good.
Jabari Parker had a chance to tie the game with two free throws with 19 seconds left, but he missed both to lead to a 114-108 finish.
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Eric Freeman is a writer for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at efreeman_ysports@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!