CLEVELAND -- After LeBron James and Kyrie Irving saw a combined 77-point night wasted in a 118-113 loss to the Golden State Warriors to fall down 3-0 in the NBA Finals, James said the Warriors possess "probably the most, most firepower I've played in my career."
The Cavs led the Warriors by six with 3 minutes, 9 seconds left before Golden State closed on an 11-0 run, led by Stephen Curry and Kevin Durant.
Durant hit a go-ahead 3-pointer with 45.3 seconds left to punctuate his 31-point night. He now has scored 30-plus in all three games of the Finals. Curry contributed 26 points and 13 rebounds.
Klay Thompson, after starting the series going 3-for-16 in Game 1, shot 11-for-18 on Wednesday en route to 30 points.
"I said it after we won the Eastern Conference finals that we're getting ready for a juggernaut," James said. "It's probably the most, most firepower I've played in my career. I played against some great teams, but I don't think no team has had this type of firepower."
James lost to the San Antonio Spurs in the 2014 Finals, his last with the Miami Heat, before coming back to Cleveland for a second stint. Many basketball pundits at the time said the Spurs played near-perfect basketball.
The Warriors are doing it differently than the Spurs, but with no less effectiveness.
"Even when you're playing well, you got to play A-plus-plus, because they're going to make runs and they're going to make shots and they got guys that's going to make plays," James said. "So we made enough plays tonight to still win the ballgame, but they made a couple more."
James finished with 39 points, 11 rebounds and 9 assists. Irving had 38 points, 6 rebounds and 3 assists. It broke Cleveland's perfect 4-0 all-time record in the postseason when both James and Irving score 30-plus points.
The 77 points were the most scored by a duo in a loss in Finals history, edging Jerry West and Elgin Baylor, who combined for 76 points in a Los Angeles Lakers loss in 1962.
The Cavs had a plus-minus of plus-7 in the 46 minutes James played and were minus-12 in the two minutes he rested. He is averaging 32 points, 12.3 rebounds and 10.3 assists per game in the series, putting him on pace to become the first player in Finals history to average a triple-double, according to ESPN Stats & Information. James also passed Sam Jones, Bill Russell and Baylor to move from seventh to fourth in career Finals scoring. James needs two points to pass Michael Jordan (1,176) for third on that list.
Irving, meanwhile, scored a career-playoff-high 26 points in the paint on 13-for-16 shooting. The 26 paint points are the most by a player 6-foot-3 or shorter in the past 20 postseasons.
Despite the output, the duo's magic seemed to run out in the fourth quarter. James and Irving combined to shoot 1-for-10 on contested shots in the fourth after they were 22-for-36 (61.1 percent) on contested shots through the first three quarters. And they both had plays in the final minute that will be remembered for not going their way.
James passed to Kyle Korver for an open 3-point attempt with 52.5 seconds left and the Cavs up by two points. Korver missed.
Irving took a step-back jumper from the right wing -- the same spot he hit his notorious winner in Game 7 last year -- with 26.5 seconds left and the Cavs down by one. He missed too.
"We had some really good looks," James said. "It's a miss-or-make league. We make a couple, they miss a couple, and it's the other way around. But it didn't happen that way."
Added James: "For me personally, I gave everything I had tonight. So win, lose or draw, you live with the results."