Richard Jefferson claims entire Cavs organization was rooting for Thunder to beat Warriors in 2016

Richard Jefferson — who won a title playing for the Cleveland Cavaliers — claimed that the entirety of the organization hoped that the Oklahoma City Thunder would eliminate the Golden State Warriors in the 2016 Western Conference Finals.

“We were really hoping for OKC to finish this out,” Jefferson said regarding the Western Conference Finals matchup between the Warriors and Thunder. “We were really hoping. Yeah, to be clear, the Cavs — the whole organization was rooting for the Thunder.”

For a little while, it seemed as if the Thunder — who were led by Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook at the time — would go on to represent the Western Conference in the 2016 NBA Finals instead of the Warriors. After all, Oklahoma City won three of the first four games in the best-of-seven series and blew out Golden State by 24 points in Game 4 to secure a commanding 3-1 series lead.

But the Warriors then mounted a comeback of epic proportions, considering the team won Games 5, 6 and 7 to secure their second consecutive appearance in the NBA Finals. None of the wins necessarily came easy, though, as all three contests were decided by single digits.

After coming all the way back to win the 2016 Western Conference Finals, the Warriors ironically blew a 3-1 lead in their next series against Jefferson and the Cavaliers in the NBA Finals.

Golden State — who finished the 2015-16 regular season with the best record in the history of the league at 73-9 — won Games 1, 2 and 4 of the championship series all by 11 points or more before dropping the final three games.

What makes Cleveland’s comeback in the NBA Finals so impressive is that, to this day, no other team in the history of the NBA has ever come back all the way from a 3-1 deficit to win in seven games. On top of that, two of the last three wins that the Cavaliers needed to secure the 2016 title came on the road.

The Cavaliers won Game 5 in Oracle Arena by 15 points and the deciding Game 7 by just four.

But considering that the Warriors were fresh off a historically successful regular season at the time, it makes sense as to why the Cavaliers organization was allegedly rooting for the Thunder to reach the NBA Finals.