CLEVELAND — The Cavaliers are going to have to win 37 straight home games if they want to match last season’s 39-2 record at Quicken Loans Arena.

Cleveland never got it together at the offensive end Thursday night in losing 86-85 to the Chicago Bulls, leaving its home mark at 2-2.

The Cavaliers didn’t lose their second home game in 2008-09 until the final game of the regular season, when LeBron James, Mo Williams and Zydrunas Ilgauskas sat out in order to rest for the playoffs.

“You’ve got to score the basketball in this league to win games,” James said after watching his team score 58 points over the final three periods and shoot .407 for the night (33-of-81).

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Down one, Cleveland had the ball with 4.3 seconds left. James drove left against long-armed Luol Deng, only to run into equally long-armed Joakim Noah. There was some contact, but no call was made and James lost the ball out of bounds with 0.2 seconds left, effectively ending the game.

“I felt a push from Deng and I felt some contact up top from Noah,” James said. “Enough to put me on the free throw line? Yes, but that’s a judgment call from the officials.”

James led the offensively challenged Cavaliers with 25 points, seven rebounds and six assists, while Shaquille O’Neal had 14 points, 10 rebounds and five blocks and Anderson Varejao had 12 points and 13 boards.

Williams had a horrendous night from the field (4-of-13) that included several key misses down the stretch, while the Cleveland bench, outside of Daniel Gibson, simply should have been benched.

Delonte West (1-of-5) wasn’t very good, Ilgauskas (0-of-9) was absolutely awful and J.J. Hickson (0-of-4) was so bad in three first-half minutes the Cavaliers nearly had to call timeout to get him out of the game.

“You take Gib out of the equation and our bench is 1-of-18,” Cleveland coach Mike Brown said. “That puts a lot of pressure on your defense.”

Cleveland also made just 12-of-20 at the line and didn’t look good at all when the 7-foot-3 Ilgauskas and 7-1 O’Neal were on the floor together, yet it was in the game until the bitter end for one reason.

“Neither team could make a shot,” James said. “It’s that simple.”

The Bulls (3-2) went up 84-78 when Brad Miller scored with 2:36 to go, but when James hit a 3-pointer with 1:33 left, the Cavaliers (3-3) were back within one.

Chicago’s John Salmons then beat Varejao and appeared to have an easy shot in the lane, but James came over from the weak side and swatted it off the backboard, only to have Williams miss a wide-open 3-pointer at the other end.

The Bulls rebounded and called time with 1:30 left, but Salmons missed an open three and West came up with the ball after a wild scramble, only to have Williams badly miss a shot he shouldn’t even have attempted.

Chicago then threw the ball all over the court before Deng finally tossed up a runner in an attempt to beat the shot clock, but it failed to draw iron, giving Cleveland possession with 4.3 ticks on the clock.

James, however, couldn’t bail his team out.

“That’s not what won or lost the game for us,” Brown said.

In different ways, James and the Cavaliers were both hurting at the end of the second period.

Midway through the quarter, James rolled his left ankle when he stepped on the end of the elevated floor along the baseline, but he quickly shook off that mishap.

With 1:32 to go in the half, James unsuccessfully tried to save a ball along the opposite baseline, forcing him to leap over a cameraman and dodge some fans. He landed partially in an aisle and partially on the edge of a chair and stayed down for several minutes. James hit his right arm and suffered a cut on his left forearm, but stayed in the game.

“I took some good shots tonight,” the 6-8, 250-pounder said. “For the most part, it wasn’t from the Bulls. It was from fans and chairs.”

The Bulls weren’t exceptional by any means, but they closed the second period on an 8-0 run to take a 46-43 lead at halftime. Cleveland, which went 7-of-24 from the field in the quarter, didn’t score for the last 3:35.

“Offensively, we’re not in sync,” James said.

Tonight

• Who: Cleveland at New York
• Time: 8
• Where: Madison Square Garden, New York
• TV/radio: FS Ohio, ESPN; WTAM 1100-AM

Contact Rick Noland at (330) 721-4061 or rickn@ohio.net.

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