Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports
Here’s a fun project. Go back through the rosters of the last few NBA Champions, take away two of their three best players and consider whether or not said team would’ve still won it all.
Could the San Antonio Spurs have won their recent titles without Tim Duncan and Tony Parker? What about the Miami Heat without Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh? Or the Boston Celtics without Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett?
It’s tough to believe these or any other teams put in such a situation would’ve still ended up winning a championship. When you take a Finals-caliber team and remove two of their top guns, the odds of said club still winning are raised to near-insurmountable heights.
The Cleveland Cavaliers have been put in this exact situation, losing Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving for the season midway through the playoffs. And, though their Finals series with the Golden State Warriors is only tied 1-1, you can’t help but be amazed at how well this team can continue to change its identity on the fly.
The Cavs entered the postseason looking to utilize good, not great defense in order to get by while their floor-spacing offense contributed most of the work in their victories. Then, they lost Love. Suddenly, things looked bleak for Cleveland, as their inability to spread the floor was now going to make it difficult to beat the Chicago Bulls.
They did so in six games, and for most of the series, you could never tell this was a team who lost one of their biggest weapons. With a need to completely revamp their strategy to make up for life without Love, the Cavs did so in near-flawless fashion.
Again, Cleveland planned on making a deep postseason run due in most part to their potent, high-scoring offense. Within four games, they had to scrap this and find a new blueprint. The Cavs decided to shift focus on ramping up their defensive efforts. To say it’s worked would be an understatement. Cleveland’s defense has gone from average to suffocating.
They took on the Atlanta Hawks, the Eastern Conference’s top seed, and wiped the floor with them. They’re now pitted against an offensive powerhouse in Golden State, and they’ve held them to an average of 92.5 points in regulation during the first two games of the series.
Tasking a team with doing a complete 180 when it comes to their playing strategy mid-playoffs should theoretically send things off the rails. It would’ve be understandable if Cleveland’s shift from offense to defense in terms of core strategy would result in a rocky transition, one that could’ve very likely ended the team’s postseason run.
That it hasn’t resulted in such a thing is a surprise on its own. That it’s been successful enough to put the Cavs within three wins of an NBA championship is nothing short of remarkable.
The Warriors, for their part, seem to be dismissive about the impact of Cleveland’s defense, specifically when considering the efforts of Matthew Dellavedova on Golden State superstar Steph Curry. Many players seemed to be of the belief last night’s loss was just due to their shots not falling, nothing more, nothing less.
There may be some weight in this, sure. At the same time, you just can’t disregard how effective the Cavs’ defense has been in this series. It’s slowing down a juggernaut, and putting a team missing two All-Stars in a position to stun the world.
The Warriors may maneuver their way out of this cold shooting. In fact, it’d be astounding if they didn’t. However, it won’t be without dealing with yet another intense defensive effort from Cleveland.
Such a strategy wasn’t the plan for the Cavs coming into the postseason, but they’ve been forced to switch gears. Gone is the highlight reel offense, replaced with gritty and smothering defense.
This kind of shift in identity can take some teams an entire offseason to implement. The Cavs did it in a span of days. Regardless of how this series finishes, you can’t marvel enough about this.
Casey Drottar is the Cleveland Beat Writer for www.Rantsports.com. Follow him on Twitter or “Like” him on Facebook
