Cleveland, welcome to the NBA playoffs! After the Cavaliers waltzed through the first two rounds of the post-season with nary a defeat, the wine and gold played a very good Orlando team last night and lost Game 1, 107-106, and now trail the best of seven series, one game to none.
Still, it’s not a reason to panic. While the Magic are arguably the best road team remaining in the playoffs, they also have the worst home record of the four teams left standing. However, it does make Friday night’s game two a must win for the Cavs.
While the rust from all of the inactivity did not manifest itself in the first half, which ended with Cleveland holding a 15-point lead, it was definitely there. The Cavaliers got off to a great start due to the emotion of playing in the conference finals, but in the end the poor shooting of Mo Williams and Delonte West, which may have been caused by the layoff, probably did in the Cavs.
The defeat occurred despite an unbelievable performance from LeBron James, who hit 20 of 30 shots from the floor, in route to a career playoff high of 49 points. There was some post game criticism about the rest of the team standing around watching, but it’s not as though James was forcing shots. Also, he hit two-thirds of his attempts, it’s not like he was 13 for 30.
The problem was that outside of Anderson Varajao, no other Cleveland player hit more than half his shots. That was the biggest factor on offense, not #23 being red hot.
If you’re the Cavs, you know you have to have a better defensive effort that you had in the second half. However, I would be smiling thinking Orlando shot 55% from the floor, and won by one point.
The Cleveland defense did let the Magic three point shooters go crazy after halftime. In the first half, Dwight Howard was doing the bulk of the scoring and the Magic was trailing by 15. The Cavs seemed to be staying at home against the perimeter players for Orlando, and they were winning. When they started doubling down low, the Magic shooters, Rashard Lewis and Hedo Turkoglu in particular, got it going.
I think Mike Brown will go smaller Friday night, by leaving James on Turkoglu, but putting Sasha Pavlovic on Rashard Lewis. Pavlovic is quicker than Varajao, and should be able to play up on Lewis better than the Cavs’ big men, who have to be worried about Lewis getting past them.
Ultimately, the Cavaliers need better shooting from Williams and West, who had a lot of open looks, and also from Wally Szczerbiak, who didn’t really contribute in game one. If that happens, the Cavs will be fine.
The Cavs have their first must win game in the playoffs on Friday night. They cannot afford to go down 0-2, and head to Orlando in that situation. Everyone expected the wine and gold to win at least one game in Florida, now they have to if they are going to win the Eastern Conference title. Remember that the Lakers lost the first game at home to Houston, and won the series. The Celtics lost the first game in round one to Chicago, and won the series. It’s not the end of the world. But, the Cavs have to win Game 2.
JK
Cleveland Sports Perspective 