Cleveland advances to the NBA finals after being beaten and eliminated

Most everyone outside of Orlando who watched the series between the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Orlando Magic was hoping that Lebron James and the Cavaliers would advance to the NBA finals to face Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers. That would be the ideal match-up, pitting the two biggest stars in the league against one another. However, Orlando had other thoughts on the matter and defeated Cleveland by a score of 103-90.  They were seemingly on their way to advancing to the NBA finals, but their celebration was cut short when NBA commissioner David Stern announced immediately following the game that it would be “much better for the league if Cleveland moved on instead.”

“I just can not allow this golden opportunity to pass by the NBA and all our fans. This is the match-up every fan wants and we’re going to give it to them,” said Stern. “As of this moment the Orlando Magic have been disqualified from postseason play and the Cleveland Cavaliers will take their place in the NBA finals.”

Reaction from the Orlando locker room was obviously quite angry. “What the hell do you mean we’ve been disqualified?,” Dwight Howard demanded to know. “We beat them up and down the court. We’re the ones that should be going to the finals! Just because every one’s in love with Lebron doesn’t mean they deserve it more than we do.”

Orlando coach Stan Van Gundy was not as restrained. After learning the news, Van Gundy was seen tearing up his office and spewing expletives. He refused to be interviewed except to say “David Stern can kiss my ( expletive)!!!”

Reaction on the Cleveland side of things was obviously much more jovial. Their locker room went from being sad and depressed over the loss, to ecstatic and celebratory upon hearing the commissioner’s news. “We did it, we finally did it!,” said Lebron James. “We’re going to the NBA finals!” When reminded that his team actually had lost to Orlando just minutes before, Lebron replied, “That doesn’t matter now. All that matters is that we climbed the hill and we got here.”

League revenues for the Finals will surely skyrocket and the series will be ratings juggernaut. However, with Orlando looking on from the sidelines, it just doesn’t seem quite fair.

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This entry was posted on Saturday, May 30th, 2009 at 9:28 pm and is filed under Basketball, Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.