Recap: Trailblazers 108, Cavaliers 96 (Or, There’s the Other Shoe).
2014-01-15
The game was tied at 96 with 2:31 left. The Blazers were looking forward to the start of a road trip and the Cavs were eager to end theirs. It felt like the game had set the table for another classic finish between these two odd rivals, but then the other shoe, which had been levitating conspicuously near the Moda center’s jumobtron fell with a thud. LaMarcus Aldridge went off and the Blazers ended the game on a 12-0 run, a run which the Cavs were powerless to stop. The Blazers seemed stifled the whole game, more by themselves than by Cleveland, but after the official timeout when it was tied, they played like their mental block had been lifted and they torched the Cavs.
The game started like the one yesterday, with Luol Deng hitting every shot he took. Nicolas Batum is a far superior defender to Wes Johnson, but Deng couldn’t be slowed early on. The Blazers, off a long layoff, were fairly sloppy and gave the Cavs the ball back. Cleveland shot 55% in the first half, but didn’t get to the rim enough and shot zero free throws in the frame. Meantime, Portland only made one three in the period. It was a weird quarter and the Cavs stayed up by shooting better than the Blazers.
However, the Cavs success seemed like a slight mirage. The Blazers are an elite shooting team and they kept getting open shots. This happens; shots don’t always go down, no matter how open. Cleveland was getting by on hitting the types of shots Portland was missing. Most of the offense ran through Kyrie, Deng, and Waiters, who all scored over 20 points. We didn’t get another epic Lillard v. Irving duel, although both had good games.
Tristan Thompson struggled to guard Aldridge straight up, but he was a force on the glass. Varejao wasn’t substantially better, and the team was forced to occasionally send help. Tyler Zeller played nine minutes and got his money’s worth, picking up five fouls in that time. Aldridge was generally able to pass out of these double teams and find shooters in the first half, but Cleveland at least varied their defensive looks.
In the fourth, the magic started to run out a bit for the Cavs. They managed to keep it close, but it was a more tenuous affair. Deng started to lag a bit, his jumpers falling noticeably short at times. Waiters hit a long three to give the Cavs a one-point lead with just under four minutes left, but then Aldridge came alive. He immediately answered with a three, his first of the season, then scored six more straight. Aldridge also reclaimed dominance over the glass and pulled down two timely boards which Portland turned into two quick threes to seal it. What was tied in crunch time became a blowout. Portland never even needed to play the free throw game. Cleveland moves to 2-2 on the road trip, with a game in Denver on Friday.
Etc.
– The Blazers announcers kept pronouncing Luol Deng’s name as ‘Loo-El.’
– Jarrett Jack hit a three tonight and that’s about it. Ditto for C.J. Miles, who the team didn;t run anything for really.
– Henry Sims earned a brief one-minute cameo at the end of the first half.
– Luol Deng loves that left elbow jumper. A few times, he even dribbled further from the basket to get to his spot.
Tony O, you keep trying to turn our young Russian into a Spaniard. It’s Sergey.
2 of those drives Dion was looking for a cutter or someone to receive a pass. Those are things they hopefully get better as people other than Andy and Zeller learn that you should follow Dion to the bucket cuz he will give you the ball for an easy shot…
Back to back on west coast trip, I think they did okay okay, They should win tonight in Denver and I take 3 out of 5 for now. Chemistry is very important for a young team, hopefully they learn from this trip and we go from there. I take 35 to 38 win this season . We should develop Sergio and of course Bennett , they’re both young and promising players. I try to be positive about coaching staff , but I think we need an specialize offensive assistant. Mike Brown is a good coach but he needs help on… Read more »
@KJ – Dion had one turnover, but about three drives that led to wild shots that didn’t have a prayer.
Given where the team is at, I’m not sure we have any chance at trading for Love. It’d probably take TT, Dion and our unprotected 2014 1st and another future pck. Even with that, I’m not sure we’d get him. and, would he sign an extension with us?
I wouldn’t be too greedy and try to make more big moves until we see what we have with the current roster. Re-signing Deng plus some growth from the youngsters might be enough to make them a top tier playoff team next year. If Kyrie finds his groove the youngsters figure out how to play together there will be a lot of improvement just from the current roster. If they can keep Deng, they will be over the CAP but will possibly be able to bring in some new blood via the draft and the $5.3M they will have via… Read more »
@Cory
Cleveland Gets: Jeff Teague, Kevin Love
Atlanta Gets: A. Bennett, Ricky Rubio, 2014 Memphis 2nd rounder, 2015 Miami 1st rounder
Minnesota Gets: Kyrie Irving, Jarrett Jack, Tristan Thompson, 2014 Orlando 2nd Rounder, 2015 Memphis 1st Rounder.
BOOM
@Kojo Outside of trading Kyrie, I’d deal damn near anything on the roster to get Love. If the Cavs could make a deal for Love it would be significant. Money-wise you would probably have to trade three of the following Dion/Tristan/Bennett /Gee/Clark along with a couple draft picks depending what you sent (2014 first and Memphis pick). I doubt they’d take Jack since they already have Rubio and Barea. Not sure if they’d be interested in Andy but Andy and Tristan works money-wise. A core of Irving, Love and Deng is about as good as there is in the league… Read more »
I hope Brown doesn’t plan on playing Deng 40 minutes a night. He pulled that stuff on Kobe in LA playing him 40+ a night – just to eek into the playoffs. Really wore the guy down. I believe Brown has trust issues with his bench – which leads to his horrible use of his bench, not just now – but his entire career. Gee is bad, but I think he can play 10 minutes a night in the right situations. Clarke is bad. *See Gee comment above. Agree with comments that Kyrie’s D needs to improve. Opposing PG’s go… Read more »
I don’t know how everything works rating first rounders but I wouldn’t mind trading Thompson, 2015 first and ____ for K Love … Resigning Deng 3 yr 36 mil and figuring out how to resign Kyrie
And yes Kyrie is a max player … Asik got the max (!!!) if he doesn’t get it here he will get it somewhere else.
Hot Sauce, yeah that’s true. He was just off (short) on about every 3 ball e took. That’s going to happen sometimes. What we need is someone not afraid to take those shots even if they’d been off all night. That’s what shooters do.
We are definitely right there. The team is close and I’d be shocked if – barring injury – they didn’t make the playoffs.
Well said, Hot Sauce.
Kyrie really killed us in the 4th. Went hero mode and missed everything.
But you can see that this team is close. Kyrie, Dion, Deng, TT, AV has a chance to really be a great line up…. Time is ticking though. They need to become great soon.
@Scott, Dion had one TO last night…
Things you can always expect to see in a Cavs game: Dion getting into the paint with relative ease but having no plan whatsoever when he gets there and turning the ball over. Kyrie sticking to screens and letting his man have wid eopen looks. Jarrett Jack needlessly hoisting up contested long pull-up jumpers with plenty of time left on the shot clock. What’s alarming about the Cavs is how many pull-up jumpers they take. There are 43 NBA players taking 4+ pull-up jumpers a game (excluding Kobe and a couple others with only a few games played this season).… Read more »
typo, sorry. the one sentence should read: He was very successful last night when he went INSIDE; he needs to keep doing that and stop firing up long 2s and 3s if they aren’t falling.
Delly didn’t look good last night. Miles has started to cool off. Zeller is playing very well in my opinion–a lot tougher and assertive than he ever was last season. I don’t understand why MB subbed him out in the 3rd quarter when he picked up his 5th foul. We were saving his 6th foul for what purpose? Zeller didn’t get any more run in the 4th quarter anyway. That was a head scratcher as Zeller was playing well and we went with a frontcourt of Clark and TT and got smoked to finish the 3rd quarter. Kyrie is missing… Read more »
That’s because there is this organizational sickness where certain players aren’t allowed to be disciplined for doing stupid things. I mean seriously this is ridiculous. Who is the Spurs best player? Tony Parker and Duncan, who Pop can clearly be seen screaming at when they make even minor mistakes. Seriously is Jarrett Jack like 100% on open 3pt attempts this year? And why does he have this thing where he’ll be wide open, then dribble 4 feet INTO someone guarding him to take a fall back jumper? Dion does this as well, and now Kyrie is doing this which I… Read more »
Brown is harder on Dion than Kyrie and mark my word he will be better for it.
12 mins isn’t much for Jack and mIles for starters. Delly did his job slowing down their self-proclaimed best backup PG in the West. I’ surprised so many missed on who he was. LoL Do you want him back here? Still glad he is gone! Jack did a great job feeding Zeller the ball WHEN Brown let him in. I think everyone forgets how good the Blazers are and they were well rested to boot Cavs were competitive with them all the way until the last 2 mins. The effort was there. They played very hard from a back to… Read more »
Don’t get me wrong, I think Kyrie is a good player. But now that Deng’s on the team, don’t we have to admit that Kyrie isn’t even as good as Luol and therefore probably shouldn’t be considered a superstar?
I’d like to see him raise his play, specifically generating more assists, now that he has a legitimate wing scoring threat.
Delly was terrible today and I wish Brown would recognize when there is not a good match-up for Delly on the floor and limit his minutes accordingly.
Btw, streaky Miles is back to the cold part of his streakiness…
Zellar and Dion worked well with each other in the pick and roll. That’s a positive take away.
What’s up with havi Dion and Kyrie on the floor together for so long? It gets aggravating to see so much dribbling. Matty D should get a little love during those overlap times.
Did Kyrie score in the 4th? I don’t think he did…