Cavs have mountain to climb

CLEVELAND – Time to bust out the hiking boots, grab some sturdy ropes and maybe even hire a Sherpa.

The Cleveland Cavaliers have some serious climbing to do.

Deep in the heart of Texas, the Cavs dug themselves a canyonesque hole. Looking like lost tourists in their first NBA finals, they dropped Games 1 and 2 to the playoff-polished San Antonio Spurs, who with the exception of a fourth-quarter letdown on Sunday night, have mastered Cleveland.

The Cavs will host a finals game for the first time in their 37-year history tonight, and they’re hoping to turn around this lopsided series in boisterous Quicken Loans Arena.

“It’s going to be electrifying,” LeBron James said.

Shocking the Spurs won’t be so easy.

Creeping toward their fourth title, and third championship in five years, the league’s best defensive team unleashed its offensive fury on the Cavs in Game 2 as Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili combined for 78 points.

The awesome threesome helped the Spurs bolt to a 25-point lead after two quarters and by the end of the third it was: Big 3 68, Cavaliers 62.

Pride kicked in and Cleveland frantically rallied in the fourth, trimming a 29-point deficit to eight in the final minutes before the Spurs stopped giggling, made a few more clutch plays, and finally put the Cavs away.

Though new to the finals, the Cavaliers are in a familiar place: down 0-2 in a playoff series. They lost the first two games to Detroit in the conference finals before winning four in a row over the Pistons.

•Game 2 of the NBA finals took a hit in the TV ratings, drawing a 6.9 overnight rating on ABC, down 24 percent from last year’s 9.1 for Game 2 between the Dallas Mavericks and Miami Heat.