CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The Cavaliers seem better since the trades, yes, but they still need Kevin Love.

That much was apparent in Cleveland's 110-94 loss to the San Antonio Spurs Sunday at The Q.

Consider this: LeBron James finished with 33 points, 13 rebounds and nine assists. The rest of the Cavs' starters shot a combined 6-of-28 and couldn't get on the court for any real minutes in the fourth quarter.

The individual numbers were ugly:

George Hill, two points on 1-of-7 shooting.

JR Smith, two points on 1-of-8 shooting (0-of-6 on 3s).

Cedi Osman, four points and four fouls and 1-of-6 shooting.

Tristan Thompson, at least, set a season high with 13 rebounds. He contributed six points in 23 minutes.

Love, who broke a bone in his left hand on Jan. 30, is an All-Star averaging 17.9 points and 9.4 rebounds. He's going to be out for at least another few weeks.

"We always need Kevin," coach Tyronn Lue said. "He's an All-Star player. Of course if you lose an All-Star player you're always going to miss him, yeah. But he's not here now so we've got to play without him."

The Spurs snapped a four-game losing streak. They were led by All-Star LaMarcus Aldridge, who scored 27 points. Danny Green added 22 off the bench. All five of San Antonio's starters scored in double figures. Dejounte Murray scored 10 of his 13 in the final quarter.

The Spurs, trailing 74-71 with 35 seconds left in the third quarter, took control with a 16-0 run that didn't end until Kyle Korver's 3-ball with 9:07 to go in the game. Murray scored six consecutive points during the run -- which began back in the third with a Green 3 and Forbes' jumper.

"That's a five-point swing, us having a three-point lead," James said. "We're still down two, but we just couldn't get a bucket to start the fourth. We turned the ball over a couple of times and that's where the momentum kind of switched."

Former Cleveland State standout Bryn Forbes added 12 points off the bench for San Antonio.

James, who fell one assist shy of another triple double, passed Rod Strickland (7,987 assists) for 11th place on the NBA's all-time list. He entered play averaging a triple double in February (25.8 points, 10.0 rebounds, and 10.6 assists).

Jordan Clarkson scored 17 points off the bench and Jeff Green added 14 for Cleveland.

The Spurs won this one in part at the foul line. They were 25-of-32 from the stripe to the Cavs' 10-of-14. Cleveland also allowed 29 points off of 16 turnovers -- six of those giveaways belonged to James.

The Spurs, playing the last of six consecutive games on the road, were without Kawhi Leonard and Manu Ginobili for both games against the Cavs this season -- Ginobili for various, minor injuries (bruised sternum now) and Leonard for the quadriceps issue that's forced him out of all but nine games this year.

San Antonio also beat the Cavs there on Jan. 23, 114-102.

This was likely the Cavs' worst game on offense since trading for Hill, Clarkson, Rodney Hood and Larry Nance Jr. on Feb. 8. They shot 38-of-91 from the field and were 8-of-34 on 3s. (Yes, the Cavs were 8-of-35 on 3s in a loss Thursday to the Wizards -- which was also at home).

Not a good way to kick off a five-game homestand.

"Did I not tell you guys this," James said. "Did I not tell you guys this: we're going to have some games where we look great, we're going to have games where we don't look as great. I think we played well tonight, we just didn't make shots, same with the Washington game. I think we played well that night.

"Defensively, we were in tune. They started making shots, we couldn't make no shots. It's not a surprise, not to me."

Forbes banked in a 3-pointer at the buzzer to give his Spurs a 25-20 lead after one quarter. The Cavs opened the game shooting 7-of-23 and 1-of-9 on 3s. Thompson grabbed nine rebounds in nine minutes.

James' 3-pointer with 1.7 seconds left in the half put the Cavs ahead 53-50 at the break. Cleveland led by as many as nine in the second quarter. But Green scored 10 of his 16 first-half points in the second and brought the Spurs all the way back. James scored 12 in the quarter and was up to 17 at halftime.

"We just had a rough night shooting the basketball," Lue said. "It's going to happen. I thought defensively we were pretty good. They end up shooting 44 percent, but at halftime they shot 34 percent. I thought defensively we were pretty good. I just thought Aldridge took advantage of us in that third quarter, the start of the third quarter on his postups.

"Overall we did some good things but we still got to continue to get better."

NEXT:

The Cavs host the Brooklyn Nets at 7 p.m. Tuesday.