Golden State Warriors: 3 takeaways from Game 3 vs. Cavaliers

1. This series is over

If you took the Cleveland Cavaliers in seven games for your 2018 NBA Finals pick, congratulations! You are technically still alive.

However, for the more pragmatic observers, it’s quite clear this series is over. No team has ever fallen behind 0-3 in a seven-game series and come back to win, with those teams being 0-131 all-time (including 0-13 in the Finals).

LeBron James has defied history before, but that was before this unassailable version of the Dubs came to be. The Kevin Durant cheat code version went up 3-0 in last year’s Finals too, and though the Cavs avoided the sweep and forced a Game 5, a gentleman’s sweep was thoroughly predictable as soon as the series shifted back to Oakland.

My original prediction for this year’s Finals was another gentleman’s sweep, but an outright sweep wouldn’t be surprising based on what we’ve seen so far. The Cavs gave the Dubs their best punch in Game 1 and still lost. They gave King James help in Game 3 and were at home in a game where both of the Splash Brothers were off, and still lost.

Seriously, in a game where LeBron James tallied a triple-double, the Splash Brothers combined for 21 points on 7-of-27 shooting, Kevin Love was as energetic as he’s been in years and Rodney Hood and J.R. Smith were both X-factors, the Cavs still lost.

Next: 2018 NBA Finals Game 3 recap and reaction

The Warriors are invincible. All three Finals games have been entertaining, so any talks about this being a boring series are highly overrated, but you can also understand NBA fans bemoaning how predictable (and short) the end result will be. The Golden State Warriors will be the 2018 NBA champions. The question now is how many more games are left in the season.