Cleveland Cavaliers Are Starting To Figure Things Out in the Eastern Conference
Don’t look now, but the Cleveland Cavaliers are starting to look like a team ready to compete in the Eastern Conference.
The best part of it all? The production isn’t just coming from the offensive side of the ball.
The Cavaliers’ defense has improved by leaps and bounds since the season started. In fact, Cleveland is quietly in the top 10 in points allowed per game at 98.5, and sixth in points allowed overall.
Dig a little further into the stats and you will find that Cleveland has only allowed opponents to shoot 45.9 percent from the floor, which is not the greatest number but is still nothing to go into panic mode about. Cleveland’s defensive rating of 106.3 is also 15th in the league, which is fairly average.
More from Hoops Habit
- The 5 most dominant NBA players who never won a championship
- 7 Players the Miami Heat might replace Herro with by the trade deadline
- Meet Cooper Flagg: The best American prospect since LeBron James
- Are the Miami Heat laying the groundwork for their next super team?
- Sophomore Jump: 5 second-year NBA players bound to breakout
So if Cleveland’s defense is not extremely bad, why have so many fans and analysts been saying that it needs a lot of work?
Well, the team does lack an elite rim protector. Anderson Varejao and Tristan Thompson have done the best job they can on defense, but neither has the real length and instinct to be an impact shot blocker every time down the floor.
And Kevin Love certainly is no defender either, with his defensive win shares being tied for a career low at 0.9 and one of the worst marks in the NBA. Love doesn’t give the effort required to be an excellent defender on each possession, but it doesn’t help that he lacks the lateral quickness and overall length to be a real disruptive force down low.
Most of the defensive problems do stem from the low post area, but the Cavaliers have done a great job at defending the perimeter, with LeBron James, Kyrie Irving and Shawn Marion all stepping up their game this season in making sure that opponents cannot penetrate and get easy looks from deep on them.
The most effective defender on the perimeter, however, has been Matthew Dellavedova.
Dellavedova has missed 15 games already this season due to injury, but when he has been on the court, he has been a real pest for other teams to deal with. In Cleveland’s game Thursday night with the Oklahoma City Thunder, Dellavedova gave Kevin Durant real problems down the stretch and throughout the whole game in spurts for that matter.
Dellavedova doesn’t back down from any player, no matter how big or tall he is, because he knows how to get low and really disrupt anyone’s handle on the ball. Dellavedova may not have the length to play the passing lanes as effectively as some guards, but he doesn’t let that stop him from playing top-notch defense on the outside.
As a unit, the Cavaliers have done a much better job at being vocal with each other and recognizing when to call for help on defense. Better communication has led to improved rotation and movement, which has forced the opposing team into some rough looks in the low-post and the mid-range.
Offensively, well the best have only gotten better.
Many projected that this Cleveland team would be one of the best offensive units in NBA history, and when this team is rolling, it is hard to argue with that notion.
Cleveland can spread the floor with four effective shooters on the floor at a time, an offensive system similar to what the Miami Heat had while James was on the team. One thing that really helps this team become such a dangerous bunch is when James is the point guard and catalyst of the offense.
Letting Irving play off the ball and focus on scoring the basketball takes away any pressure for him to be a better distributor and allows him to take better advantage of his strengths in order to help his team win games.
Love’s versatility has also been a welcome addition to the offense, as he can play out of the post or on the perimeter and light up the scoreboard. Not to mention Love’s passing, particularly his outlet passing, may be some of the best the NBA has to offer from its big men.
With a number of shooters to stretch the floor and the ball movement to create looks for those open shooters, the Cavaliers are a very tough team to stop, especially since they have three elite scorers that can all create their own shots in crunch time. As long as the defense continues to hold, the Cavaliers will be contenders when it counts.
The improvements so far have been noticeable. Now comes the hard part: consistency.
*Statistics courtesy of Basketball-Reference and ESPN