Every NBA team’s greatest playoff moment

Cleveland Cavaliers: To the King goes the spoils (2016 NBA Finals)

When LeBron James took his talents to South Beach and announced it publicly via the ill-conceived “The Decision” special, Cleveland Cavaliers fans felt betrayed. The hometown hero was bailing after numerous playoff shortcomings. Thus, the jersey-burning from fans and the comic sans memos from Dan Gilbert were born. LeBron went off and won two titles in four trips to the Finals in Miami before deciding to come home. With his return, not all was forgiven, but it was a giant head start in the right direction.

However, the case for James upon his return to Cleveland was truthfully the same as it was when he was taken No. 1 overall in the 2003 NBA Draft. Anything less than bringing an end to the Cleveland title drought was going to be deemed as a failure for the man who dubbed himself King James. And though the Cavaliers reached the Finals to take on the Golden State Warriors, they fell short in 2015. Making it back to that point in 2016, again up against the Warriors, it looked as if it was another failure in the making.

Cleveland fell behind 3-1 in the series and faced a bleak outlook ahead. Though their one victory in the first four games came by way of a 30-point blowout in Game 3, they too had been handled in their three losses. Not unexpectedly considering they were facing a team that’d won 73 games in the regular season, the Cavaliers looked outmatched. Then LeBron flipped the switch, as did the rest of his team.

Over the final three games of the series, James averaged 36.3 points, 11.7 rebounds, 9.7 assists, three blocks and three steals per game while turning the ball over just 2.7 times per contest and shooting 50.6 percent from the floor and 42.1 percent from 3-point range. Despite the long odds of success, LeBron proved beyond any measure of doubt that he’s the best in the world at this silly game and erased a 3-1 deficit to bring a championship home to Cleveland.