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Warriors-Cavs NBA Finals Game 3 Live Blog: News, Updates and Highlights

Stay up to the minute on everything involving Game 3 of the NBA Finals.

Kenny Ducey

Warriors-Cavs NBA Finals Game 3 Live Blog: News, Updates and Highlights
Warriors-Cavs NBA Finals Game 3 Live Blog: News, Updates and Highlights /

The Cavaliers host the Warriors for Game 3 of the NBA Finals on Wednesday night. If you want to follow along with our live box score, click here.

Defending champions Golden State has a 2–0 lead over Cleveland in the teams' fourth consecutive matchup after taking Games 1 and 2.  

The biggest story of the Warriors' 122–103 win in Game 2 was how the Cavaliers would bounce back from J.R. Smith's mistake in the final seconds of regulation of Game 1. Smith got the rebound from George Hill's missed free throw, but instead of putting it up, Smith took the ball to the three-point line near James. After a quick verbal exchange with James as both were too far away to get a clean shot off, Smith passed it to Hill in the corner. Hill was unable to get a shot off in time and the game went to overtime. The Cavs lost the first game 124–114. 

Despite some runs from James and the Cavs, the Warriors easily won Game 1, and Stephen Curry set a Finals three-point record, making nine three-pointers. 

On the injury side of things, forward Andre Iguodala was orginally ruled questionable Tuesday after missing six straight postseason games. He was deemed active and played his first minutes of the series in the first quarter. 

Outside of the game, Warriors and Cavs have been dismissing President Donald Trump after he uninvited the Eagles from the White House. James said that neither the Cavaliers or the Warriors would want to go to the White House if they win the championship. Curry agreed with James. 

First Quarter

Hey there, so, uh, LeBron threw an alley-oop to himself. For the second straight Finals.

And JR Smith raced out to a fast start to help the Cavs grab a nice early lead. 

Stop me if you've heard this before...but we've got double techs between Draymond and Tristan Thompson!

That was all pretty fun for a while, but the Warriors started to hit their shots and managed to close the quarter down one. They were able to erase what was once a 10-point deficit.

Second Quarter

The Cavs came right back in the biggest of ways, jumping out to an eight-point lead thanks to some bully ball from LeBron (and another three from JR).

Call up your friends, old Kevin Love is back!!!

If you've been following the Rodney Hood saga and would like an update on that, he's been getting minutes—10 of them, in fact—and put up six points on four shots.

Kevin Durant ended the half with 24 points on 10 shots, which is absolutely disgusting. He cut the lead to six.

Third Quarter

The Warriors, who dominate third quarters, have predictably erased the halftime deficit in short order.

The Cavaliers got their first free throw of the night—if you can believe that—on this and-one from LeBron.

The Warriors have taken the lead by five, but at least Cavs fans can re-watch this gorgeous finish from Tristan Thompson!

Kevin Durant is unstoppable right now, this is insane!

Could this be the Rodney Hood game?

We've got a two-point game heading to the fourth! The Warriors just outscored the Cavaliers by eight in the third. KD has 34 on 11-17 from the field, and both teams are shooting over 47%. It's gonna be a great finish.

Fourth Quarter

Yeah, I think this is the Rodney Hood game.

...We interrupt these highlights to note that Steph Curry is currently 1-of-14 from the field. One. Of. Fourteen.

LeBron isn't exactly getting whatever he wants on the offensive end, but he went into attack mode here for a nice bucket. This one's going back and forth.

Durant did it again. Goodnight.

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Kenny Ducey
KENNY DUCEY

Kenny Ducey writes baseball, basketball and off-beat stories for SI.com. He is a member of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America, and an editor at Baseball Prospectus.

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