Moments in time.
All night long in Cleveland, they waited. Folks back in the Twin Cities kept an eye out for it, too -- that signature moment of estranged star versus former team, hero-turned-villain against the remnants he left in his wake.
For 42 minutes and 47 seconds of game time -- about two hours on the courtside season ticketholders' Rolexes -- it didn't come. Strangely, surreally, Kevin Love was just another guy, a cog in the wheel of the LeBronmobile.
But the flashback finally came. At the 5:13 mark, Love scrapped for an offensive rebound in the paint, caressed in a putback and completed a 3-point play from the foul stripe.
By then, the Cavaliers' victory over Love's old squad had been sealed. But this was a vintage Love move, the kind people around the Target Center grew used to the past six seasons.
Ultimately, though, that's all the Love era in Minnesota amounted to. A series of snapshots that, when fused together, only add to a photomosaic of ultimate futility -- the kind that drove the All-Star power forward away and has the Timberwolves in full reconstruction mode once again.
There was 31-31, 26 and 12.5. There was the last-second 3 against the Clippers. There were the countless double-doubles.
There was also the ink to a four-year, non-max deal. There was the lost 2012-13 season. And the 2014 Summer of Love that saw him traded to these Cavaliers.
Tuesday night at what Clevelanders call "The Q," that past and the present collided. As long as Andrew Wiggins, drafted first overall by the Cavs and sent to the Twin Cities in the Love trade, is wearing slate blue and black, those colors' osmosis with wine and gold will paint a picture of an altered NBA -- one with a new "Big 3" and the game's next potential superstar germinating in the Land of 10,000 Lakes.
It might not have been apparent when Love went out of his way to converse with former teammate Kevin Martin and president of basketball operations Flip Saunders between the teams' morning shootarounds. But by tipoff a little after 7 p.m. local time, the new Love was exposed.
The one who plays second, often third, fiddle and is shooting six fewer times this season than last.
Love's 20 points and 10 rebounds were familiar enough. But it's clear this is James' team, and for it to fulfill its championship aspirations, point guard Kyrie Irving must be a focal point, too.
"Kevin was the main focus here," Saunders said. "He got a lot more touches. He was able to get into a comfort zone, and he's the third option (in Cleveland)."
But Love's decision to spurn Minnesota (5-22) wasn't about individual stat-stuffing, he said. Six seasons of that left him feeling frustrated with the mounting losses and unappreciated when former president David Kahn and owner Glen Taylor withheld a five-year extension from him in 2012.
By the time Saunders took over in May 2013, it was too late.
"I think he was set in stone the minute he got his four-year contract," Saunders said.
But Love's first reunion with the team that snagged him in the 2008 draft wasn't a robotic one. He caught up with Saunders and asked Martin how he and other injured starters Ricky Rubio and Nikola Pekovic are doing.
With those three out and Corey Brewer traded last week, most of Love's teammates weren't on hand for this inaugural reunion.
"Weird," Love called the entire scene.
As for his new role, he's adapting just fine, at least according to the man definitively ahead of him on the totem pole.
"He's a star here," James said defiantly after a question regarding Love's altered status in Northeast Ohio. "We all just want to win. That's it. That's all that matters."
They are, but slowly. After six playoff-bereft seasons in Minnesota, Love is playing for a team that's 17-10 and currently in the Eastern Conference's fifth playoff slot.
The kid forever tied to him via August's blockbuster trade, meanwhile, gave a sellout crowd of 20,562 a glimpse into what might've been had one of the zaniest offseasons in NBA history not unfolded the way it did. Wiggins, whom the Cavs dealt with Anthony Bennett in a three-team deal shortly after LeBron's homecoming, had 27 points, a steal and a block in what Saunders called one of his most complete games yet. He guarded James, too, helping "limit" him to 24 points.
The 19-year-old, Canadian swingman hailed as the best prospect since James himself went from the possibility of the King's tutelage to an unexpectedly primary set of duties, a situation he says he prefers -- even if it comes on a team that's lost six straight and is on a collision course with a top-five lottery pick.
"I've been put in a bigger position and a bigger role than I would've on that team," Wiggins said. "That's just helping me grow more, mentally and physically."
He wasn't the only former Cavs' No. 1 overall pick on the floor Tuesday. In fact, there were four of them (Wiggins, Bennett, Irving, James) -- the first time any four top draft selections have played in the same game in five years.
A 19-1 Cleveland run spanning the final two quarters ensured a rather bland finish to the quartet's first meeting. Love's disgruntlement away from the floor, Saunders said, should make for a more salty reuniting when the teams face off Jan. 31 in Minneapolis.
"Minnesota people, they're pretty loyal," Saunders said. "When you turn on Minnesota, they don't forgive you. People might've appreciated him when he was here, but when you leave under the terms that he did, just the way Minnesota people are, they're not very forgiving along those lines." Love agreed.
"I know when somebody leaves that they more often than not don't want to say good things about him," Love said. "I think (Saunders is) right in a lot of ways, but at the same time, I made a lot of great relationships in the Twin Cities that'll carry on throughout my career and post-career."
They were rekindled Tuesday. But the man who once shouldered Kevin Garnett-like expectations has moved on. His former team, too.
The Wolves will return to Minnesota before continuing a four-game road swing Friday at Denver. The Cavs now travel to Miami for a nationally televised Christmas Day game.
It'll be LeBron's turn to face his old friends.
And in another singular moment, basketball's past will meet its present.
"It's natural," James said. "Any human being would (anticipate his or her return) anywhere. No matter where you work, if you go back to where you've been there for a while, you always get that thought of going back."
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