The Cavs defense has and will remain an underrated part of their Finals run
Holding the Warriors to just 107 points before overtime, the Cleveland Cavaliers defense has been underrated throughout their entire postseason run.
Do you remember back in February when the Cleveland Cavaliers ranked No. 29 in defensive efficiency? Well, that defense has flipped the switch, yet again proving never to doubt a team led by LeBron James.
This postseason, the Golden State Warriors have averaged 114 points per game on their own court. They’ve done so by exploiting their opponents weakest big and taking him off the dribble.
Just like the Cavaliers, that’s been the game plan for most teams this postseason. For Cleveland, they look to switch superstar LeBron James on Steph Curry almost every possession and visa versa for Golden State. They do their best to break down Kevin Love and or Tristan Thompson off the dribble.
However, there isn’t a single team that is stacked with five superstars.
So for Cleveland, their gameplan has been to lock down the Warriors shooters and force a player like Kevon Looney or Draymond Green to beat them. It’s simple really since Green shot 13% outside of 10 feet against the Rockets and Looney dare not shoot anything besides a layup.
Tyronn Lue prepared his team with a similar gameplan for Game 1, but it hasn’t just been Game 1 in which Lue has seen defensive success. The Cavaliers entire Finals run they’ve proven to be a capable defensive team, something many didn’t think could happen earlier this season.
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The Cleveland Cavaliers finished the regular season as the league’s 29th worse defensive, giving up over 109 points per 100 possessions. Well, this postseason they’ve decreased that by three and during their last eight games (the entire Eastern Conference Finals and Finals Game 1) they’ve decreased it by five.
Obviously, you win by scoring more than your opponents, and Cleveland has been elite at limiting their opponents scoring compared to the regular season.
In 82 regular season games, the Cleveland Cavaliers held their opponent to fewer than 100 points 19 times. Well, in the postseason, they’ve done that 9 times in 19 games, almost 50% of the time they’ve locked their opponent down.
It’s really started with a more engaged LeBron James. Albeit James picks and chooses his times to engage defense, when locked in, James leads a dynamic Cleveland defense.
The most important aspect of Cleveland defense is the ideal size of their point guard and center.
In Game 1, when Curry purposefully switched onto Thompson or Love, he was actually far more less efficient. Curry shot 11-for-23, 48% from the field in Game 1. On Kevin Love, he shot 40%, and on Tristan Thompson, he shot 25%.
In 26 possessions, he scored fewer than 10 points on Cleveland’s two bigs.
As for George Hill, his entire career his seven-foot wingspan has helped him defend quicker guards. Hill, defensively, didn’t have a faultless Game 1, but that size makes it difficult for Kerr and the Warriors to exploit him.
Along with an underrated and highly scrutinized Tyronn Lue captaining the ship, the Cavaliers have surprisingly been far better defensively than most would’ve ever expected.
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If this keeps up throughout the entire Finals along with more dominating efforts from LeBron James offensively, the Cleveland Cavaliers could be hoisting their second Larry O’ Brien trophy in the last four years.