HERE are the Cavaliers, one win away from the NBA Finals in their first season of the Re-LeBron era, and the morning-after forensics and debate from a lively Game 3 are about … Matthew Dellavedova?

That’s the result of Dellavedova, the backup point guard pressed into duty with Kyrie Irving nursing a knee injury, upping his postseason body count to three yesterday.

He initiated a collision that got Hawks star Al Horford ejected for a flying elbow drop to Dellavedova’s dome — and the Cavaliers went on to a 114-111 overtime win.

In the previous game, the 6-foot-4 Aussie KO’d Kyle Korver from the postseason during a loose-ball pileup — the sharpshooter likely needs surgery for a severely sprained right ankle — and, in the prior round, provoked the Bulls’ Taj Gibson into an ejection with a leg-lock.

As James Bond creator Ian Fleming once wrote: “Once is an accident. Twice is coincidence. Three times is an enemy action.”

An equally influential and imaginative figure named LeBron James represents the “Delly” defence.

“Well, you just play the game the right way,” James said after game three, according to ESPN. “At this point, you try to do whatever it takes to win. You don’t want to hurt nobody. No one, I think, in our league goes around trying to hurt people. But you don’t take the aggressive nature out of the game.

“I’m a little bit off about it because this is my guy, this is my teammate and this is a guy that goes out and works his tail off every single night and people are trying to give him a bad rap. He doesn’t deserve it and I don’t like it.”

Is Dellavedova a floor-burned hustler or a good-for-nothing goon?

Here is the evidence:

DELLAVEDOVA vs HORFORD

Horford: “I did think he went at me, but I should have handled it better. Shouldn’t have gotten caught up in that and it’s something I’ll definitely learn from. The game before I got hit in the knees and it just kind of played over again.”

James: “And there’s no difference between me boxing out, or Al Horford boxing me out and Delly boxing someone out. That is a fundamental box-out. That’s all it is.”

Horford: “He’s a player that plays hard, but there’s got to be a line at some point. He’s got to learn. He’s only been in this league for a couple of years, but he’s got to learn that at the end of the day, it’s a big brotherhood here. Guys look out for each other and I don’t think it was malicious, but he’s got to learn.”

J.R. Smith: “It was a dirty play. Delly plays hard; he’s not going to try to hurt anybody. But that was a dirty play. I know a little thing about dirty plays, so, it was a bad play. [The referees] made the right decision [to eject Gibson]. … There’s just certain things you just don’t do.”

In an article simply titled “Matthew Dellavedova is a dirty player”, USA Today’s Mike Foss did not mince his words.

“This is a guy who doesn’t know the line and is risking other players’ careers,” Foss wrote.

“And what no one is considering is the fact that this is just the third time TV cameras and audiences have noticed Dellavedova mixing it up with opponents.

“Does anyone really believe he isn’t bringing his unique brand of ‘hustle’ to his game off the ball?”

In Cleveland, however, the story is different. A poll on cleveland.com suggests Cavs fans are more than happy with Delly’s approach on the court.

More than 70 per cent of respondents voted that he was not crossing the line and he should not change his style at all.