Post-Game Thread, Cleveland - Away

[bobheckler]

No Kyrie Irving, true, but LeBron played 26 minutes and Kevin Love played 31.  Also, if Irving was playing then LeBron might have had the ball in his hands less (always a good thing, if you can get it) and Mike Miller, who is averaging 13mpg for the season but only 7mpg over the last 5 games, might not have even gotten off the bench and torch us for 11 points.  Dellavedova had 8 assists.  That's about as many as Irving would have had.  I hoped that our guards would be able to play more offense, with Irving out and so they don't have to burn as much energy on defense, and they did.

The game had playoff intensity.  That is an excellent proving ground for the Celtics.  We came out with energy and, with the exception of a stretch in the 2nd half when the Cavs rallied to zero out our lead and gain a small one of their own, maintained our focus.  I don't know whether to be irked that we lost a 16 point lead or being pleased that we tightened up and produced a run that got us back up to a 3 possession game with under 2 minutes left.  We did win 3 out of 4 quarters, it was just that 37 point 3rd quarter by Cleveland that hurt.  All 11 of Mike Miller's points came in that quarter, so I'm thinking that those would not have happened if Irving was playing, but Mozgov's 7 points in that quarter are worrisome since none of his points ever come from outside of 5'.  Same story, different colors.  LeBron gets the ball, LeBron penetrates, LeBron muscles in a layup or gets someone a dunk.  Bosh, Mozgov, Thompson, Anderson; the names and faces change but some things don't.  LeBron is a freak.

1.  But he was only 5-14 last night.  All in all, some good defense played against him last night (or, at least, as good as humanly possible).  He got a dunk because Crowder got caught watching the ball and LeBron took off without the ball down dunk lane but, in general, the defense on him was good.  He missed a lot of layups and nobody on either team were hitting their free throws.  The Cavs had 11 fgm in the 3rd and LeBron assisted on 6 of them.  He had 7 assists on the game so, just like with Miller, he made most of his noise in the 3rd.  He was 5-14 on the night, helped by going 0-5 from 3.  It didn't help missing a dunk neither.  You gotta say one thing for LeBron. Whatever he does, he does it bigger than everybody else, including missing dunks.  His missed bounced off the back of the rim so hard it went out of bounds all the way underneath HIS basket.  He was 4-9 from frito.  Not one of his better productions, which means we better batten down our hatches on Sunday.

2.  Smart had a helluva game last night.  He was hitting his shots, 7-10 and 3-5 from 3, for a Celtics' high 19 points (Kevin Love tied him at 19).  He also didn't give JR Smith much joy last night either.  JR got the collar, going 0-4.  We've all had our frustrations with Smart's offense.  I just have to keep reminding myself how rare it is for a player to come out of college and have both their offense and defense fully NBA-ready.  His defense is there, in spades, it is his offense that needs polish.  Last night he had the stroke.  I still say his shooting mechanics will will put a ceiling on his efficiency, but last night he proved me wrong and I couldn't be happier to be wrong.  10 of his points came in the tone-setting first quarter with Smart going 4-4 and 2-2 from 3.

3.  Steady Eddie had a very UNsteady 4 TOs, with 2 of them being passes to nobody.  His Bass-o-matic stroke was on but he looked off otherwise.  Tristan Thompson is a load.  Thompson with the #4 pick in the 2011 draft and is now a bench player.  Bass had 3 steals, offsetting his 4 TOs a bit, but should not be leading the fast break.  That was one of his turnovers.  Give it up sooner, Brandon, and run to the front of the rim.  You like being there more anyway.

4.  Kevin Love had his stroke last night too, shooting 4-8 from 3 and looking smooth in the process.  I don't think he's happy there, but if they win a championship he'll get over it.  Talent-wise, this is one scary team.  Their weakest link is their coach, rookie David Blatt.  He comes with outstanding bona fides as the coach of Euro powerhouse Maccabi-Tel Aviv.  Did you know the immortal Joe Forte, drafted 21st in the 2001 NBA draft at the insistence of Red, is a current player with Maccabi-Tel Aviv?  He's 34 years old.  Back the Cavs, their biggest problem might be David Blatt's inexperience at the NBA playoff level.  Fortunately for them (and maybe unfortunately for us given where we are in the standings today), it's LeBron's team anyway.  I like our situation better.  Because we don't have superstars like Irving, James and Love all of our players have bought into Brad and his system.  Will that translate into winning a playoff series?  Probably not, you still need the talent, but Brad will get his experience and, as we've seen this year, a year is all he seems to need to not only catch up to his peers, but to pass them.

5.  Jonas Jerebko was given credit for 4 offensive rebounds.  What I'd like to know is "do those 4 offensive rebounds include all the balls he back-tapped to a Celtic?"  He has, what is commonly referred to as, a "lively body".  He gets to spots, he jumps quickly and gets his fingers on A LOT of balls.  He did a pretty good job of defending Methuselah Marion, moving his feet so Marion was pinned on the baseline with no angle on the rim.  Danny, Brad and Jonas have an interesting conundrum approaching.

6.  Sully's timing is still way the hell off.  He is just not scoring well.  He is not using his body as well as he used to.  His rebounding, though, is there.  Still the board monster with 8 boards in 19 minutes.  His 4 TOs, though, were bad.  His brain hasn't made its way back yet as far as fitting into a motion offense scheme.

7.  Bradley drove Joe Harris crazy.  Bradley had all 15 of his points by the half, with a lot of those coming off of high pick screen curls.  The same play, every time and Harris got hung up on the screen.  Every.  Time.  Sully set a few of those screens.  Sully's offense is an eyesore but he's doing the fundamentals.  He also finished a fast break led by Thomas.  His shooting defense against Dellavedova was pretty good too, limiting his shots.

8.  Thomas' shooting turned back into a pumpkin after that smoking hot last game.  4-12 from the floor but 7-8 from the line.  He was probably the only Celtic who aggressively attacked the paint and rim, the smallest guy on either team.  One reason why he was 4-12 is because he threw up a couple of wild shots, anticipating a whistle but not getting one.  The refs weren't giving him them last night.  Who the hell are these guys:  Gary Zielinski, Bill Spooner, Justin Vanduyne?  They were being very contrary last night.  They weren't giving Thomas his usual fouls but they did call LeBron for traveling!  In Cleveland!  

9.  A low profile game for the subject of Sam's Bromance, Jae Crowder.  Two things that caught my eye (I'm sure Sam will fill up a few column-inches with the rest) was that he stole the ball from Tristan Thompson along the sideline by almost baiting him.  He hung back a bit, but inched forward with an eye on the ball, and when Thompson tried to pass it to Dellavedova, Crowder stepped in between them and stole the ball (foul on Dellavedova).  A very savvy veteran defender's ploy.  On another sequence there was a mismatch down low and Crowder RACED from the far weak-side to try to get between the entry pass and the Cav down low.  There was a foul called before it, so there was no pass nor steal nor boxscore entry nor play-by-play mention of it, but Crowder was flying in with the help defense.  The man is glue.  So is Jerebko, so is Bass.  Danny has some tough decisions coming up.  Hopefully, re-signing Jae Crowder won't be one of them.

10.  Turner didn't score a lot of points, only 4 on horrible 2-8, but he had 13 assists and only 1 TO.  He also had the unenviable job of guarding LeBron for most of the night and he did a pretty good job of that.  With zero 3pt fgas, I am more than happy to take my chances with Evan Turner shooting from mid-range.  One of his shots was a big one.  With 1:16 left to play he snaked in for a layup that gave us a 9 point lead and that effectively iced it for us.  Good defensive effort (excellent, really, when you consider who he was guarding) and facilitating the offense without turning the ball over.  Just give me more of that, Evan.

11.  I knew it was going to be a tough matchup for Zeller against Mozgov.  He is HUGE.  It drives me crazy when Zeller doesn't dunk at the rim.  He blew a bunny because he tried to lay it in instead of powering it in.  Mozgov was 6-10, all inside, for 13 points but a surprisingly anemic 2 rebounds.  Mozgov and Sully did about as good as they could against Mozgov The Moose.  To the surprise of nobody, we need length.  Personally, I think we need length (did I mention I like 7'0" elastic man Kristaps Porzingis?) more than beef and the fact that Timofey Mozgov didn't go all Cossack on our asses is proof.  What kind of a name is Timofey for a moose anyway?  He looks more like a Bullwinkle.  What do you think?







Yeah, so LeBron and Love didn't play the 4th and Irving didn't play at all.  So what?  We still played well.  LeBron had an off game.  So what?  He could miss fritos in any game, not just this one, and Turner's defense on him was inspiring and, possibly, reproducible.  We're playing like a playoff-worthy team.  Playoff series winning team?  Maybe, maybe not, but we deserve to be where we are.  As Doc always used to say "you are your record" and our record is a mind-boggling 37-42.  I know, I know, I've mentioned that before.  I'm mentioning it again and will mention it in the future, not because I don't think anybody is unaware of it but because I can't hardly believe it myself.  I say "37-42" the same way I'd say "I just hit the lottery".  No.  C'mon.  Really?  There must be a mistake.  Could you check the numbers on the ticket again to be sure?  37-42.  I thought we might have a shot at the playoffs if we got to 35 wins not because we'd win more than that but because I thought the EC would suck so bad that might possibly be enough to sneak into the 8th spot.  We're not sneaking into anything.  We control our own fate in the 7th spot by virtue of owning the tiebreaker with Brooklyn.  We own that tiebreaker because we earned it.  We earned it by beating a team with multiple all-stars (Williams 3x, Lopez 1x, Johnson 7x) more times than they beat us.


The Magic Number for making the playoffs is now 2.  The Magic Number for locking in the 7th spot is 3.

Toronto is at Miami today.  Two games in the loss column behind Boston, our Magic Number vs Miami is only 1 but they own their tiebreaker with Brooklyn.  With luck Toronto can drive the final coffin nail, ala Bram Stoker, through DWade's heart.  On Sunday Brooklyn has a tough matchup in Milwaukee and we try to grind our way past The Wrath of James.  OKC is at Indy.  

We're lookin' good.  Not just as far as making the playoffs go, but our play.  Brad is doing a helluva job keeping everybody focused.



bob


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[beat]

Bob

Re Bron

heard a rumor that he might not even travel to Boston let alone play.

beat

[Sam]

Good summary, Bob.  Not much to add.  As for Crowder, if one wished to, there could be many beneath-the-radar things to talk about.  As for that dunk by James, (1) he gets a lot of them that are basically uncontested because what's the use? and (2) Crowder is a master at help defense, and it's not shocking that he might have hoped for at least a semblance of it on that play.

Six consecutive road wins.  What odds would Los Vegas given for that possibility back when the season was starting.

I'll cut this short because I'm getting lots of rest while ingesting humungous amounts of spinach in case Brad needs me to careen out of the stands displaying my big red ess tomorrow afternoon.  Looking forward to meeting with Bobc, Brandon, and Bob's other guests as well as the poster known as Futbol from BDC.

Sam

[kdp59]

not to be a downer here, but I thought Cleveland played like a team phoning it in most of the game. especially the first half.

that's good for us getting in the playoffs for sure last night though.

but I really don't want to have to play them in a playoff series. that's right I'd rather we play Atlanta right now.

[bobheckler]

not to be a downer here, but I thought Cleveland played like a team phoning it in most of the game. especially the first half.

that's good for us getting in the playoffs for sure last night though.

but I really don't want to have to play them in a playoff series. that's right I'd rather we play Atlanta right now.

kdp,

I don't agree with your first point.  I think Mozgov, Jones and Love all played hard and, while LBJ played the role of "facilitator" a lot in the 1st half, he played hard.  He ALWAYS plays to win.  They got off to a slow start. Nothing we haven't seen and done before ourselves. Blatt, by sitting Love and LBJ in the 4th, is another story.

I do agree with you, though, on preferring to play Atlanta.  They will be down Sefelosha for the rest of the way.  Also, we can play well against them but how do you stop a raging LeBron James?  How do you stop an unconscious Kyrie Irving?

If Brooklyn tucks it to Milwaukee and we get hit with Hurricane James, we might get our wish and end up in 8th and Atlanta.  Either way, I'm happy.  Our players need to be tested in a playoff series.  Our coach and most of his staff have no NBA playoff experience (Larranagga and Waltah are the only ones).  It's part of taking the next step.  I'd love if we could do a Phoenix-rising-from-its-own-ashes sequel like we saw with the drafting of Bird and the trade for McHale and Parish, but those confluence of events happen once a franchise lifetime, if you're lucky.  You could say we've had the luck of the leprechaun by having it twice, once with Bird/McHale/Parish and once again with Pierce/Allen/Garnett; with the 3 key players all coming together within a year or so of each other.  I wouldn't want to have to bank on it happening a third time, so I'm okay with making the playoffs evenif it means getting punched in the nose, if that's what happens.  There is only one way to get playoff experience, as a team and as a unit, and that's to play in them.

There's an old joke, or truism, in golf that goes "100% of the putts that do not reach the hole, do not go in".  Well, 100% of the teams that do not make the playoffs do not win championships.  Make the playoffs and anything is possible.  LeBron might sprain his ankle.  Irving might get kneed in the thigh and have it stiffen up on him.  None of that matters if you aren't in a position to take advantage of it because you missed the playoffs.




bob


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[kdp59]

well...based on how Cleveland ahs been playing, they took the night off in my eyes.

we did have good playoff effort no doubt and not trying to minimize the win. I'll take any we get from this point on.

but Cleveland has looked like a freight train the latter part of this season.....I don't think anyone in the east can stop them WHEN they come to play.

but like you said Bob...you never know what can happen.

[beat]

Agree with Kdp on this one. Although Cavs made a run to get a small lead..... they started out with so so effort IMHO especially on the D end, and certainly the last 5-6 minutes did nothing to make me think they put much more of one to finish it.  

I'll take it regardless but also would much prefer the Hawks as a first round draw should we make it.

And on the same front although we played hard I don't think overall we played particularly well either. Just too many mistakes.

beat

[Sam]

I don't believe that starting slowly is a foreign concept with the Cavs.  With the talent and power they have, they can afford to "feel out" the opposition during the first half to see how little effort they can get away with and, if necessary, make a stirring comeback in the second half.  In fact, I think that approach is more satisfying to the fans.  That script almost recurred last night, as the Cavs forged a lead in the last quarter and were only a couple of superstars away from being highly likely to prevail.

Besides, who cares about Cleveland?  The fact is that our guys played very energetic basketball nearly throughout the game, and that was good enough to win a big game.  They have no control over what they'll be up against in any given game; their job is simply to beat whatever they face.  And they did just that.  Absolute end of story.

I always preach that the enjoyment of the game is enhanced for fans if they try to envision it from the players' perspective.  And, believe me, the Celtics players are not standing around today and lamenting the fact that Kyrie Irving was out with an injury and the coach decided to shave a few minutes off Lebron's and Love's playing time.  Nosiree, the Celtics players are justifiably feeling pretty good about the way they dictated the pace right from the start, were energized pretty much throughout the game, played some excellent defense, and refused to take their feet off the pedal at the end.  But most of all, they're looking ahead to tomorrow's game and trying to use last night's contest as a learning experience.

Sam

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