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CLEVELAND -- In the days before the wounded San Antonio Spurs descended on Cleveland, LeBron James anointed Kawhi Leonard the new face of the Spurs' franchise now that Tim Duncan has retired. Against the defending champions, he certainly played like it.
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Leonard scored a career-high 41 points, including 10 early in the fourth quarter and the game-clinching dunk in the final seconds of the Spurs' 118-115 overtime victory on Saturday night over the Cavs.
They did it without Pau Gasol and Tony Parker. Gasol is sidelined indefinitely with a fractured bone in his left hand and Parker missed the game with a sore left ankle. But a healthy dose of Leonard and LaMarcus Aldridge was enough to topple the defending champs on their own floor.
The rivalry between Leonard and James, meanwhile, continues to sizzle.
"I'm just having fun out there playing against him," Leonard said. "We've been through battles in the Finals, and always when I'm playing somebody on a great team, it just pushes your energy and you're just having the most fun at that time.
"You can't be out there being lazy or scared. You've just got to go out there and compete and hopefully get a win."
James tied up Leonard for a jump ball with 13 seconds left in regulation and the Cavs down three. Leonard won the tip, but the ball was headed out of bounds when Kevin Love saved it and fired it behind his back inbounds. Leonard caught the pass and sprinted to the other end for the dunk and the clincher with four seconds left.
After Aldridge missed two free throws in the final second of overtime and the Cavs called timeout, Love missed a contested 3-pointer at the buzzer that would have forced double overtime. Love was just 3 of 11 from beyond the 3-point line.
"That wasn't what lost us the game," Love said. "I missed the shot, but a couple after-timeouts we didn't run the right play and we had our opportunities. That shot was bad. That wasn't what did it. It was a number of plays and missed execution on our part."
One of those blown executions occurred with 24 seconds left in overtime. James received an inbounds pass and a chance to tie the score with a 3-pointer. He fired a bounce pass to the corner, but no one was standing there on the busted play.
James expected Kyrie Irving to cut to the corner, but Tristan Thompson never set the screen and Irving never cut for the corner as James was charged with his seventh turnover of the night.
"We botched the play," James said. "It's a crucial point in the game. We've got to be able to execute. As a ballclub, that's trying to win a championship, we can't have you go from a timeout to the court and forget what you're supposed to do. It's that simple."
Added Cavs coach Tyronn Lue: "We watched it on tape, Kyrie would've been open. Danny Green had no clue what was going on, but we didn't execute it right."
Leonard surpassed 30 points for the sixth straight game, and Aldridge had 16 points and 12 rebounds for the Spurs. David Lee had 14 points and 11 rebounds starting in place of Gasol.
James and Irving each scored 29 points and Love had 13 points and 11 rebounds for the Cavs. Thompson contributed 14 points and 12 rebounds.
James' deep 3-pointer from 30 feet with 34.8 seconds left in regulation tied the score at 107 after the Cavs missed their previous five 3-point attempts.
The Spurs went scoreless in the final 2:36 of regulation, missing their last four shots and committing a turnover while the Cavs erased a five-point deficit in the final minute.
Leonard missed a short fadeaway jumper over James with 13.4 seconds left and the Cavs grabbed the rebound with a chance to win it.
James and Irving ran a pick-and-roll to switch Leonard off James, but James missed a 3-pointer in the corner to force overtime.
"Great game. Anybody's game," Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. "Comes down to making shots. At the end of regulation, we had some great shots that didn't go down. In overtime, they had some great shots that didn't go down. It happens."
NOTES: Spurs coach Gregg Popovich blasted President Donald Trump for four minutes, calling him a bully while chastising his top advisers. "We've got (to) a point where you really can't believe anything that comes out of his mouth. You really can't," Popovich said while praising the nationwide protests Saturday for women's rights on Trump's first day in office. "There's a majority of people out there, since Hillary won the popular vote, that don't buy his act." ... G Tony Parker missed Saturday's game and is returning to San Antonio for an MRI on his sore left foot, the San Antonio Express-News reported. ... F LeBron James left open the possibility of returning to play for Team USA in 2020 because Popovich is the coach. James, who skipped the Olympics last summer, would be 35 in 2020. "It factors a lot," James said of Popovich's presence. "I've said that before. He's just a great mastermind of the game of basketball."
