Cleveland Cavaliers: 5 keys to beating the Warriors in the 2017 NBA Finals
4. What the Cavs…need now…is Love, sweet Love
Kevin Love could be the biggest X-factor in this series. In last year’s Finals, a concussion and the Warriors’ small-ball lineups rendered him little more than an afterthought until Game 7, when he came up with his infamous stop on Stephen Curry and 14 rebounds.
Heading into this year’s Finals, Love is playing some of his best basketball since joining the Cavs. In the playoffs, he’s averaging 17.2 points and 10.4 rebounds per game on blistering .457/.475/.855 shooting splits. He hasn’t been exposed on defense, he’s spread the floor and in the conference finals, he was absolutely unstoppable during Cleveland’s decimation of the Boston Celtics.
The question is, can he produce at a high enough level against either Draymond Green or Kevin Durant — two All-Defensive caliber defenders this season — to make up for the almost certain mismatches he’ll face on the other end of the floor?
From @brohrbach:Kevin Love is finally at ease in Cleveland, and that should make the Warriors uncomfortable - https://t.co/dDWn4HKlNE pic.twitter.com/usvArlJM9W
— Kelly Dwyer (@KDonhoops) May 29, 2017
More than likely, the Cavs will try to hide Love on Zaza Pachulia on defense, using Tristan Thompson to try and limit Draymond and giving LeBron James the monumental task of leading the offense and chasing Kevin Durant all over the damn place.
That’s a huge burden to put on LeBron fatigue-wise, since the Dubs can also use small-ball lineups to negate Love’s impact, or simply put Draymond on LeBron, let KD’s length and rebounding lock up Love and stick Pachulia on TT with only one objective in mind — keep him off the boards.
However, as much as the Dubs will attack Love using his man in pick-and-roll action, the former Minnesota Timberwolf can make an impact on the offensive end by spreading Golden State’s defense, capitalizing on his open looks, crashing the offensive glass, bullying his way to buckets in the post and continuing to thrive on the defensive boards and rapid-fire
touchdown
outlet passes.
Last year, Kyrie Irving unexpectedly outplaying Stephen Curry was the major X-factor. While it’d be great if that happened again in 2017, for the Cavaliers to repeat as NBA champions, they might need Kevin Love to fill that role this time around.