The Cleveland Cavaliers won the game. But they shouldn't feel all warm and fuzzy as they head to Miami for Game 3.
Evan Mobley absolutely deserves his flowers for shutting down Bam Adebayo's scoring game while pouring in 20 points of his own. Darius Garland was solid and got to the line for 8 free-throws, a really good sign for him. The bench mob of Ty Jerome, De'Andre Hunter and Sam Merrill continue to outpace the Miami bench.
Yet the easiest storyline from the game is how Donovan Mitchell took over the game down the stretch, turning a two-point lead into a nine-point win. He went on a personal 8-0 run to force the margin back to a safe distance, and overall he scored 17 of his 30 points in the fourth quarter.
The takeaway that Cavaliers fans need to have from this game, however, is not how Mitchell saved the day. It's that Mitchell needed to save it at all, because an old weakness reared its head once again.
Donovan Mitchell is struggling - even if it's not obvious
Donovan Mitchell surely received MVP votes this season and has a strong chance to make it onto the ballot in the fifth slot. He is a lock to make All-NBA. He was praised up and down for how he accepted a smaller role to allow Darius Garland, Ty Jerome and Evan Mobley to shine. That is true, to some extent.
Yet Mitchell also had one of his worst seasons scoring the basketball this season. His scoring dipped to 24 points per game and everyone attributed it to taking a back seat to his All-Star teammates, but he only took one fewer shot per game. He had the ball less, certainly, but he also added a good diet of catch-and-shoot opportunities -- his shots per minutes actually went up. His 3-point shooting stayed steady at 3.3 makes per game on 36.8 percent shooting, identical to last season's numbers.
That 3-point shooting masked a significant decrease in his efficiency from 2-point range. Mitchell hit only 51.2 percent of his shots from 2-point range. He took fewer shots at the rim than in his previous two seasons in Cleveland, settling for more floaters and push shots -- shots he can make, but which are less efficient. And when he got there, he shot just 60.7 percent -- down from at least 70 percent in each of the last 3 seasons.
The hope was that Mitchell's two weeks off heading into the playoffs would heal more than his ankle -- that it would solve whatever explosion issues Mitchell has been dealing with. Yet Game 2 revealed they are still present -- and that could spell doom for the Cavaliers as they go deeper into the playoffs.
In Game 2, Donovan Mitchell scored 30 points, but that was driven by his 3-point shooting. Mitchell shot 7-for-10 from deep, a large part of the Cavaliers hitting 22 3-pointers, one of the best totals in NBA playoff history. Yet the Cavs actually shot worse from 2-point range than from 3 (47.6 percent to 48.9 percent from deep) in large part because of Donovan Mitchell.
Mitchell shot only 3-for-11 from 2-point range, and only a handful of those shots came at the rim. He was consistently unable to generate an advantage with his speed or explosion at the rim.
Case in point was his first shot attempt two minutes into the game. Mitchell got exactly what he wants, Tyler Herro switched onto him. Spida should have cooked him. But he drove at him, Herro moved his feet, and Mitchell instead settled for a closely guarded step back 18-foot midranger, one of the least efficient shots in basketball. It clanked off front rim.
Shot No. 3 was a missed floater in traffic. Shot No. 4 was in transition, so he found some space, but biffed the layup. Same with No. 5. His sixth 2-pointer was similar to the first, another contested midranger because he can't blow past opponents.
His pull-up 3-pointer continues to cook, but he isn't exactly getting an incredible amount of separation on that shot, either. He is lacking something of his burst, and it makes him a less efficient player. What's more, if he cannot get consistent penetration, he is not setting his teammates up with open 3-pointers as much, either.
Mitchell didn't make ahis second 2-point field goal until the fourth quarter, making a push shot in traffic. Then in crunch time, during Mitchell's personal 8-0 run, he took a stepback baseline jumper with a defender draped all over him; he got a couple to fall, but it was hardly evidence that his explosion was back.
The Cavaliers won Game 2. Donovan Mitchell was nailing bigtime shots when his team needed him to. But they only needed the heroics because Mitchell missed so many 2-point shots earlier in the game. He couldn't impact the game on every level.
If that doesn't change, it's hard to see the Cavaliers taking down the Boston Celtics or the Oklahoma City Thunder en route to a championship. The Cavs need everything Donovan Mitchell can give them -- and in Game 2, as in most of this season, that hasn't been his best.