PHOENIX: It’s too early to know yet if it was a breakthrough, but Kyrie Irving felt like he cut loose for the first time since knee surgery during the second half of the Cavaliers’ loss to the Golden State Warriors on Saturday.
Irving concedes now he was a bit timid in his first two games against the Philadelphia 76ers and New York Knicks, perhaps only natural after spending six months rehabilitating. But with the playoff-like atmosphere inside Oracle Arena, Irving let go and just played.
“In the second half I was like, ‘You know what? Let’s just go out and play,’ ” he said. “I went out and missed about eight more shots and I was cool with that.”
Irving laughed when he was asked if he ever thought he’d be happy with missing eight shots.
“No, not at all,” he said. “Not at all.”
Irving returned to the starting lineup for Monday’s game at the Phoenix Suns, but he’ll sit Tuesday at the Denver Nuggets. He is preparing as if it’s the last game he’ll sit this season.
“That’ll be the last time I sit out back-to-backs,” he said, “and hopefully the last two games I miss for the rest of the season.”
The game against the Nuggets will conclude a stretch of four games in five nights and five games in seven nights. The schedule will loosen a bit when the Cavs return home. They’ll have three days off before hosting the Orlando Magic on Saturday and they won’t face another back-to-back for more than two weeks, when they travel to the San Antonio Spurs and Houston Rockets in mid-January.
He still isn’t ready to bear the full load of starter’s minutes, but Irving played 26 minutes against the Warriors and coach David Blatt indicated that number could rise again Monday night against the Suns.
“You can’t necessarily play him the number of minutes where I’m sure he’ll eventually get to,” Blatt said. “We can look to increase a little bit.”
Popular guy
Irving is second in the East in the first round of All-Star balloting despite Monday marking just his fourth game this season.
“It was good to have the fans’ votes and having the support no matter what. It means a great deal to me,” he said. “But also, you have to put it in perspective that there are other guys in the East that have played more games and are more deserving at this present moment of the season. But at the end of the day, I’m still thankful for anyone that votes for me.”
Suns bursting
The Suns entered the game against the Cavs in a freefall following a home loss Saturday to the 76ers. The Suns fired a pair of assistant coaches and promoted two others after suffering their 15th loss in their last 20 games.
Now all of the attention has turned to coach Jeff Hornacek, who is in danger of becoming the second head coach fired this season.
“That’s the business,” he said of his uncertain future. “We’re going to try to get things changed around. We’re not quitting on anything. We’ll continue to work and try to implement a couple different things and see if we can get back going. Whatever happens after that I can’t be concerned about that.”
Jason Lloyd can be reached at jlloyd@thebeaconjournal.com. Read the Cavs blog at www.ohio.com/cavs. Follow him on Twitter www.twitter.com/JasonLloydABJ.