After his Cavaliers blew a 21-point lead and wound up losing by 18 in Orlando -- a rather astounding 39-pound turnaround, and against the 17-36 Magic to boot -- Isaiah Thomas didn't mince words.
"It's like right now, when we hit adversity, we go our separate ways," the former Celtic said after Cleveland's 116-98 loss to the Magic. "And that's just how I feel and it looks like that as well."
LeBron James' assist total -- zero -- would seem to lend credence to Thomas' charge, but LeBron says his lack of assists wasn't for lack of effort.
"I gave my teammates some opportunities to knock `em down, but they just didn't go," he said. "You can't get assists when they don't go down, but that doesn't stop me from finding my guys on the floor."
The Cavs are now fourth in the East at 30-22, having lost 14 of their last 21. But James -- who says he won't be traded before tomorrow's deadline and is "here for this season" -- isn't throwing in the towel.
"At this point it's not what you say, it's what you do," he said. "We've got to go out and play well as a collective group, everyone hitting at the right time on all cylinders, and right now we're not doing that . . .
"This is no time to be ashamed about our season. We've got quite a few games left. If we're still serious about the season, then we've got to play some good ball at some point."
Boston Celtics
The Associated Press contributed to this report