The Cleveland Cavaliers fell behind 3-1 in the NBA Finals, after being defeated 108-97 against the Golden State Warriors on Friday night, and familiar offensive woes were the Cavs downfall.
The more things change, the more they stay the same for the Cavaliers.
New coach, new players, new system but the same opponent and the same old problem for the Cavs in the NBA Finals.
Cleveland often talks about the importance of moving the basketball and trusting the pass when the game is on the line. Tyronn Lue and LeBron James have stressed it all season long. For anyone who has watched the Cavs over the past two seasons, it’s an understandable concept. When the ball stops moving, the Cavaliers fall back into their isolation ways, which pretty much makes basketball an individual game.
Then why, after their offense tore through the Eastern Conference playoffs and holding a slight lead early in the fourth quarter, did the Cavs do what they plead they shouldn’t in Game 4 of the finals?
In the biggest quarter of franchise history, how does a team led by LeBron James, continually play isolation basketball when the going gets tough and the game, and in this case the season and championship, is on the line?
“Our offense did stall a little bit in the fourth quarter,” James said, via Chris Fedor of Cleveland.com. “We played a little bit too much random, trying to dribble drive, get guys looks, and then we started settling a little bit for the 3-point shot when we kind of got down. Which obviously we’ve got to do a better job of that.”
In fact, the Cavs offense didn’t stall just “a little bit”; it stalled a lot to end the game.
After halftime, the Cavaliers shot the ball 38 times. Amazingly, James and Kyrie Irving combined to take 33 of those shots. That, of course, means just five shots were left for the likes of J.R. Smith, Kevin Love and the rest of the Cavalier supporting cast.
“Well, we’ve got to be aggressive,” James said, via Fedor. “Our coach, Coach Lue told us to be aggressive. And obviously, we don’t like to hear it in that form. We want to get our guys involved and keep our guys in a good rhythm. I just think it was just the way the game played out tonight.”
Being aggressive is important for both James and Irving. After all, the duo is made up of two of the leagues best scorers. During the regular season, Irving scored 0.95 points per possession in isolation scenarios, while having an effective field goal percentage of 47.4 percent in those situations. James, meanwhile, scored 0.85 and had an effective field goal percentage of 41.1 percent in those same scenarios, so neither player was incredibly efficient playing the isolation game.
Yet, they keep going to it at the most important times.
In the fourth quarter, where the Cavs had a real chance to tie this series at 2-2, their offense stumbled. Cleveland had an effective field goal percentage of 42.9 percent in the final quarter, and their offensive rating was a putrid 84.6. Furthermore, they had just two assists on nine made field goals, shot 0-of-5 from beyond the three-point line and over a 6:37 stretch, the Cavs scored just one point and James and Irving combined to go 0-of-8 in that period.
Some credit does go to the Warriors defense. They were a lot more active and focused on that end of the floor, forcing the Cavs into some turnovers and bad shots.
Majority of the blame goes solely on Cleveland though. They know how ineffective their isolation basketball is, despite how much Lue wants to explain how the Warriors switching forces the Cavs to go back to it over and over again.
In theory, Lue makes sense when he points out Golden State’s switching demands the Cavs to play isolation basketball. When a switch occurs, the offensive player usually has a mismatch he can exploit.
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When the players switching are Draymond Green, Klay Thompson and Andre Iguodala though, neither James nor Irving can singly handily take over against that bunch of versatile defensive stoppers. Golden State wants you to play isolation basketball against them. The Warriors are such an athletic defensive unit, when you play isolation ball, it allows their defense to solely focus on one man and then collapse on him.
James is one of the NBA’s most deadly passes but when he is posting up in an isolation set against the Warriors, it neglects his playmaking ability. James’ back is against the rest of the floor, and with no other Cavalier moving to get themselves open, James has no choice but to spin into the lane, where a sea of Warriors defenders are waiting.
It’s the same problem when Irving goes on one of his celebrated dribble-dance routines, only to drive to the basket and get stopped in his track by the Warriors defenders. It’s easy to defend and plays right into Golden State’s hands.
The Cavs offense was flying through the first three rounds of the playoffs. The ball was swinging, three-point shots were going down at a historic rate and most importantly, and it was a balanced attack, not one relying on just James and Irving.
In the finals though, everything that worked for the Cavs has been abandoned in favour of a strategy that doesn’t work and to no ones surprise, it is producing the same, sad results for Cleveland.