Warriors Defeat Cavs to Even Series, Lynx Off to Strong Season Start

NBA Finals

After a bleak Steph Curry performance Tuesday evening, the Warriors faced the Cavaliers for Game 4, a second consecutive showdown in Cleveland. LeBron James and the Cavs entered the game up 2-1 in the series and feeling fairly confident.

However, the Warriors showed up to play Thursday. Golden State held the Cavs to two quarters of under 20 points, including allowing only 12 in the fourth. Curry looked more like his usual self, scoring 22 points, and Andre Iguodala tallied 22 as well. The Warriors held James to just 20 points, and his effort wasn't enough to carry the short-staffed team over GSW.

Head coach Steve Kerr went with a smaller lineup, benching center Andrew Bogut and moving Draymond Green to the middle. The first few minutes went in Cleveland's favor, but from that point on Kerr's plan worked.

The teams will head back to Oakland for Game 5 on Sunday. Tipoff is set for 8 p.m. EST.

Timberwolves Update

Wolves guard Zach LaVine has certainly been busy this offseason, between spending time in Seattle (his hometown), training in California, vacationing in Hawaii, and visiting the NBA-loving country of China for a variety of promotional appearances..

On top of all the traveling, LaVine held his first annual basketball clinic in the Twin Cities. LaVine, who will be entering his sophomore NBA season, is hosting the clinic this week at St. Thomas Academy in Mendota Heights.

While he's back in Minnesota, plenty of Timberwolves fans want to know LaVine's take on who the Wolves will take No. 1 in the upcoming Draft. After all, he's not too far removed from his own Draft experience. The Star Tribune's Michael Rand asked him just that. According to Rand, LaVine gave a pretty safe (and smart) answer:

"Nah, man, I"m not in a position to pick [the player]. I'm not the GM ... I like all of them, man, I can't pick. I'm not the one to judge. I wouldn't want a first-year player judging me if I was getting ready to get picked."

Touché, Zach. Touché.

Lynx Update

Minnesota's bench led the way Thursday night in a 94-70 blowout win over Seattle. The reserves squad scored 46 points, the most in seven seasons. Forward Tricia Liston led the way with a career-high 15 points, 12 of them coming from behind the 3-point line.

The Lynx struggled with turnovers during the first two games, but they gave the ball away only 11 times and dominated offensively. Rookie Jennifer O'Neill scored 12 points and executed some impressive plays, despite making a few errors in the beginning of the game.

"She's a fighter," Reeve said of O'Neill.

The win marked the 10th consecutive victory over Seattle at the Target Center.

Other Basketball News

• NBA signs deal with Nike. On Wednesday, the NBA announced that the league has reached an agreement with Nike. The eight-year deal will start with the 2017-18 season. The NBA is currently under contract with Adidas, which said it will not seek to renew the deal (originally started in 2006) at the end of the 2016-2017 season. Although financial details have not been released, sources say the new Nike contract will be worth $1 billion. You can read more about the agreement here.
• Detroit/Milwaukee Trade. The Pistons announced yesterday afternoon that they have acquired Ersan Ilyasova in a trade with Milwaukee that will send Caron Butler and Shawne Williams to the Bucks. Illyasova has spent his seven-year career in Milwaukee. During the 2014-2015 season, the forward averaged 11.5 points and 4.8 rebounds per game. There is speculation that the move was more of a salary dump for the Bucks; Illyasova is set to make $7.9 million this season, and clearly that space will open room to sign other young players they may be after. CBS Sports' Zach Harper posted the press release via Twitter:

Officially official on the Bucks-Pistons trade pic.twitter.com/5v73b9Wfg7

— Zach Harper (@talkhoops) June 11, 2015

Lindsey's Friday Flick Recommendation

I've been on a super hero kick lately, particularly Marvel, so I have to recommend the newest release:

Avengers: Age of Ultron

The film received a 74 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and I even think it deserved higher! Similar to the first Avengers, the movie is action-packed but also filled with plenty of witty one-liners. Tony Stark and the gang are at it again, when Stark jumpstarts a dormant peace-keeping program and things don't go exactly as planned.

Enjoy the trailer below, and happy weekending!