Stevenson Backs Up Talk With 19 Points

Before the series against the Cavaliers started, Wizards' Coach Eddie Jordan said he had no problem with some of the bold statements made by his players as long as they "walked the walk."

Well, it took until the third game but DeShawn Stevenson, who added spice to the rivalry by calling LeBron James "overrated" back on March 13, finally started walking as well as he has been talking.

Stevenson's career playoff high 19 points and five three-pointers keyed the Wizards to a 108-72 win in Game 3 at Verizon Center Thursday night and snapped the shooting slump he was in against the Cavaliers in the playoffs.

In last year's first-round series, won by Cleveland 4-0, Stevenson shot a dreadful 19.6 percent; and in the first two games of this series, he made 5 of 16 shots and averaged 7.5 points.

"Gilbert [Arenas] told me to just start letting it fly from the three-point line, and Caron [Butler] said the same thing," Stevenson said. "So, I just started shooting it and they went in for me."

Stevenson's outside shooting is crucial because it prevents the Cavaliers from using his man -- in Thursday's case that was often LeBron James -- from cheating off of Stevenson in order to help on other scorers like Butler and Antawn Jamison.

Stevenson, who connected on a career-high 158 three-pointers during the regular season (he made 38.3 percent of his attempts), missed several open shots in the first two games.

Execution Key

Jordan said the Wizards didn't cook up any exotic defensive schemes to limit James to 22 points and three assists in Game 3; they just executed better.

At various points, the Wizards double-teamed James, used traps to force the ball out of his hands and also played some zone defense. He finished with four of Cleveland's 23 turnovers and rarely attacked the basket as he did in Cleveland.

"We didn't gamble too much and over-commit too much," Jordan said. "We said that if we're solid in our schemes and our double teams and in our [zone], then we'd be okay. We have to play the first pass and the second pass out of the trap the correct way. If we do that, we knew we'd be fine. You have to be smart while you're athletic and you have to be smart while you are physical."

Time Warp

The presence of the rapper Soulja Boy, who attended Game 3 at the request of Stevenson, was an interesting story behind the victory. But Jordan said he wasn't paying attention.

"Nah," Jordan said. "To me, "Soldier Boy" is a song from back in the '60s by the Shirelles."