Recap: Warriors 112 Cavs 94 (Or, teeny tiny margins for error)
2015-01-10The Cavs lost on the road to the best team in the NBA. The final score doesn’t really indicate how competitive the game was – it was a 5-point game midway through the 4th quarter. GS blew it open in the final four minutes. The Cavs hung in there despite some abysmal outside shooting from the guys brought in specifically for that purpose. J.R. Smith had a strong game at both ends, and Timofey Mozgov really made a difference in the limited minutes he received. Kyrie Irving was like a quiet assassin at times. Ultimately, the Cavs couldn’t stop Klay Thompson and the Warriors got so many easy baskets there was just no way the Cavs were going to overcome being without LeBron.
First Quarter: The Warriors forced a number of turnovers that lead to fast break opportunities. Whenever the Cavs got them into half-court set they held their own. J.R. Smith hit his first shot and he wasn’t done. Kyrie Irving was looking to attack but he was picking his spots. The Cavs looked to get Kevin Love the ball in the post early and often. He was defended by the smaller, scrappier Draymond Green, who has become a cult hero in Oakland. Love got good position a few times and earned some free throws. Klay Thompson scored nine straight points for the Warriors and the Cavs called timeout to settle down. That’s when the new Cavs left their mark. J.R. Smith started splashing Js and Timofey Mozgov looked like the first legitimate Center the Cavs have fielded since Z. He was running the floor, stealing offensive rebounds away from smaller players, and finishing at the rim. Back to back buckets by Delly gave the Cavs an impressive 32-26 lead. But the end-of-quarter bug bit the Cavs and they went into the 2nd with a 2-point lead.
https://twitter.com/RealSportsTaIk/status/553764484603727872
Second Quarter: Herculoids sighting! If you haven’t followed the NBA’s best team (by a mile) this season, you may not realize that Mo Speights has been the NBA’s most improved player outside of Jimmy Butler. He and Shaun Livingston started the 2nd quarter and scored in the opening minutes. Both teams struggle to score for a while and then Klay Thompson drained two more 3s including a filthy step-back. Two Mozgov free throws brought the Cavs within two <ctrl+c> <ctrl+v> But the end-of-quarter bug bit the Cavs. They trailed at half-time 60-54. The fast break points were 21-0 in favor of the Warriors. The Cavs hung around by shooting well off the dribble and getting some second chance points.
@SherwoodStrauss @talkhoops Ah, the Speights-Time continuum.
— Scott Whittle (@swhittle15) January 10, 2015
https://twitter.com/WFNYKirk/status/553772789212389376
Third Quarter: The Cavs hung around in the third, having answers for each Golden State mini-run where you thought the roof was about to come off. J.R. Smith tied the game midway through the quarter with a deep 3. The Cavs actually took the lead briefly when Kyrie hit an 18-footer. But the Warriors answered with a rapid 7-0 run of their own, capped by an electric alley-oop from Draymond Green to Harrison Barnes (remember him?). Barnes dropped in two more buckets on subsequent possessions but the Cavs kept on grinding. There was a sweet sequence where Mozgov got a nice entry pass from Kevin Love and finished and on the next play he sealed two GS defenders, giving J.R. Smith a nice easy stroll in for an uncontested layup. The Cavs weren’t able to capitalize in the final few minutes and..wait maybe I’ll just write a script that auto appends “But the end-of-quarter bug bit the Cavs” to each paragraph. They entered the 4th down 8.
Mozgov got down the floor on the break and sealed under the hoop immediately with the mismatch. Neat.
— FearTheSword (@FearTheSword) January 10, 2015
The Cavs' transition D needs to improve. When they've gotten set tonight they've competed.
— Andrew Karode (@Dkarode) January 10, 2015
Fourth Quarter: More of the same. The Cavs fought hard to hang around but they didn’t play anywhere close to a perfect game, which is essentially what they needed to overcome the Warriors @ Oracle. Mo Speights canned a couple more Js before fouling out. The Cavs kept it in single digits until their offense deteriorated into “Let’s get the ball to TT down low and let him go to to work.” Bad plan. TT had pretty weak game all around but he was particularly exploited in the 4th. You kept waiting for the dam to break and it finally did with about four minutes to go. Draymond Green got to feed off his rabid fans and throw his weight around. (I think Draymond is a really nice piece, but at one point he was 2-9 and firing blanks from 3 way more than he should have. And yet my Twitter timeline was filled with CAVS FANS that were totally entranced by the guy’s energy/demeanor.) The Warriors ended the game on a 17-5 run, or “But the end-of-quarter bug bit the Cavs.”
As the title indicates, the margin of victory is always slim when going up against the best team in the association. That’s what being the best usually indicates – the best can survive cold shooting or unforced errors. When you’re the weaker opponent, you can’t allow 36 fast break points and 40 points in the paint. Especially when the Cavs mustered an embarrassing 3 fast break points and just 28 points in the paint. It’s kind of a wonder the Cavs hung on as long as they did. Their offensive flow wasn’t great, they were kind of getting bailed out with the off-the-dribble heroics of Kyrie and J.R. Smith. Kevin Love played an OK game offensively, but his inability to dominate on the low block (against smaller opponents and single coverage no less) and his reluctance to fire away from 3 unless he’s wide open hurt the Cavs tonight. J.R. Smith and Kyrie Irving took 23 shots apiece because they had to. It sucks not having LeBron right now. It’s frustrating that he so often went into “chill mode” against the weak competition the Cavs should have feasted on during the 1st two months. Now they’re trying to deal with the Varejao injury and integrate new pieces and it’s tough to do that without your best player. The Cavs inexorable march towards .500 continues.
Things I liked:
-Mozgov is a REAL BIG MAN! I’ll admit I’ve not seen him play much but I was impressed tonight. He should shore up the rebounding and give the Cavs that rim protection they have so desperately needed. He also did a great job sealing his man and other defenders in the post and providing the Cavs with a back-to-the-basket threat. He ran the pick and roll well too!
His first game; we'll get there pic.twitter.com/YgfeEcv9Ir
— Will Gibson (@wjcgibson) January 10, 2015
-J.R. Smith is still super talented. The irony wasn’t lost on me that Cavs fans were wailing and doing the gnashing of the teeth in the streets when they found out Dion Waiters was being dealt. And then the apocalyptic reactions to J.R. Smith’s name further highlighted how irrationally loved Dion was. Maybe Kevin Pelton summed it up best:
After all, Smith’s shortcomings — poor shot selection, unreliability off the court — are much of what made Waiters so frustrating in Cleveland…At the same time, there’s a big difference between Smith and Waiters: Smith has actually been good in the NBA. Waiters has posted a true shooting percentage (TS%) better than 50 percent only once in his three seasons in the NBA (.508 in 2013-14) and was still below average then. Before this season, Waiters’ most efficient season would have been the second-lowest TS% of Smith’s career.
Yikes. So yeah, J.R. Smith made 11 field goals tonight. Dion Waiters only did that nine times in his entire Cavalier career. A common Dion-quip was “he’s a guy that can get you 30 on any given night.” Thing is, he only got 30 three times in three years. So I guess what I’m saying is, J.R. Smith is better now than Dion Waiters is. Defensively he had his moments tonight as well. He was chasing Steph Curry all over the perimeter and fighting through screens. The rumors of his egregious shot selection are totally true though.
-Kyrie Irving’s effort level has been phenomenal this season. I’m not sure if the Team USA ball changed his approach or what. But defensively he’s been trying much harder and he’s flying all over the court now for loose balls and just playing like a guy that wants to earn a max contract, not someone that was already awarded it.
After diving to the floor for that loose ball, Kyrie just called for a sub. Delly comes in to finish the half.
— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) January 10, 2015
Things I Didn’t like:
-James Jones and Mike Miller were 0-8 from three and all over those were the wide open spotted-up kind.
James Jones and Mike Miller building a small house on the beach. Low heating and cooling bills, brick is efficient.
— FearTheSword (@FearTheSword) January 10, 2015
-Delly had a rough game. Teams are exploiting his inability to create off the dribble. He is forcing too many bad entry passes and unlike last season when he was a +/- wunderkind, he’s been pretty bad this season. He’s young so I hope he snaps out of it, but the Cavs are getting smoked when they go to their bench this season.
-The Cavs had 13 assists and 14 turnovers. The Warriors survive these small-ball lineups because they switch everything on the perimeter and Draymond Green allows them to handle post players (Kevin Love was pretty ineffective against Green in the post). So it’s no surprise that the Cavs got a lot of their points from Kyrie or J.R. Smith creating off the dribble. But the Cavs lack of weak-side action continues to disappoint. Guys are content to stand in the corners waiting for the guards to create something. It’s just too easy to defend and the Warriors were content to wait back and then jump the inevitable passes that the guards needed to make once their dribble penetration was cut off.
-There was some home cookin’ tonight for the Warriors. Once again, when your margin of victory is tiny (on the road, no LeBron, against the Warriors) you can’t miss so many wide open 3s and allow so many transition points. But it was frustrating watching the Cavs get hosed by the zebras.
Couple times I've thought Blatt needed to get himself T'd up to defend a player. Kevin Love getting bumped in midair with no call is one.
— David Zavac (@DavidZavac) January 10, 2015
Appreciate the good work on the recap. Liked everything but the dig against Dion fans being irrational. What is truly irrational is the hate. This was a decision based on need not the brass hating or dumping Dion. It is refreshing to see a non-biased take on what happen in this trade from the outside without trashing any of the players on Inside the NBA. The general consesus was this. The Cavs didn’t need another scorer who can put up 15-20 a night. The needed a Big Man and they needed perimeter defense. I think most of you will like.… Read more »
Agree with Chris. I am a Dion fan, mainly because he is a likable guy. It is not clear if he will ever be good NBA player, but he goes for it!
You focus was too much on shooting. At the time Green was 2-9, he also had 9 boards, 8 assists, and 3 blocks. That’s why other people (who know what they are talking about) are so excited about his energy. It isn’t just energy, but production. Again, 9 boards, 8 assists, 3 blocks, up to that point. I don’t know what he finished with, but I’ll take Green over TT any day. Much better player.
Shots fired!
Look he was 0-5 from 3 and 2-9 from the field. I get that he did other things. I’m saying he wasn’t having an all-time great performance. I like the guy.
Green’s PER is actually not as good as TT’s. Not hard to get decent assist numbers when you’re passing to the Splash Bros who hit a lot more than they miss. Yes, he’s got some dimensionality, but I think Tom was referring not just to the 2-9 (which finished out as 5-13), but also the 0-6 from three, few of which were close. It was also probably a reaction to one of the brain trust of announcers saying that Draymond might be a MAX player this summer. That’s ridiculous. He’s been a nice surprise for the Warriors this year, but… Read more »
Wow. So that’s the first time the Cavs have looked like a legitimate team, not just a gathering of players trying to pump their stats, since the last time Lebron was here. It took two games for Smith and Mozgov to make that trade feel worth it, unquestionably. Mozgov drew fouls on opposing bigs, grabbed rebounds that Thompson would normally lose for being out-talled. While it seemed weird to see Smith bring the ball up the court more than Irving, I cannot find any fault with his effort or production, once or twice maybe he got caught on a screen… Read more »
Hopefully Blatt can blend pieces together better now. He’s seemed kind of timid sometimes but when the team actually execute his set plays they’re effective. Disappointed so far but optimistic.
“Disappointed, but optimistic.” Me too. I hope most Cavs fans can get on board with this.
Recent Cavs player blurbs on hoopshype.com suggests that Cavs players are unified, determined, and confident they will prove to both media and fans they’re a top team.
If TT gets paid anything more than 8 Mill per year….. we are crazy. Andy wasn’t even getting paid that much in his prime and he is about 2x the bball player TT is. Only thing TT does well is RBs /put backs and getting blocked
Yeah, except you’re forgetting a) how much crazier the FA market has been in the last couple of years (much more so than when Andy was in his prime) and b) how much crazier the FA market is about to get with the massive increase that’s going to happen in the NBA cap. There will be teams throwing around crazy money for guys on TT’s level.
As to the Tristan thing… The problem with being over the tax threshold is that you pretty much have to overpay your guys to keep them, because you can’t sign-and-trade them, and you can’t really bring in replacements. From LibertyBallers.com Teams more than $4 million above the luxury tax cannot receive players in a sign and trade deal. If a team acquires a player in a sign and trade deal, then the team cannot go $4 million or more above the luxury tax for the remainder of the salary cap year. The best move with Tristan is probably just let… Read more »
Unfortunately, I bet some team (the aforementioned Lakers, Knicks, or maybe Jordan and Charlotte) offers TT close to 15M/per for four years which the Cavs shouldn’t (but will) match. Going to be a potentially expensive summer for Badger Lint.
“Every smart GM in the league knows you don’t overpay for undersized poor shootig rebounders… ” Yes, but when you’re David Griffin and LeBron and TT share the same agent, whose business as an agent LeBron is trying to grow just as diligently as his own on-court basketball career, it’s not necessarily about what you would do in a vacuum as a smart GM, is it?
Was most disappointed with Blatt tonight. He looked very unhappy to be there. Frankly, his body language sucked. And I know he’s probably tired, but get some fire in your belly, David! Has the guy picked up a technical all year? Team was reverting to bad habits late for the umpteenth time in the last umpteen games. Blatt just seemed resigned that the Cavs were going to lose. The first rule of sports: if you don’t believe your team can win, then you can’t win. And not playing Mozgov till garbage time? That was inexcusable. Cavs were being owned around… Read more »
I agree wholeheartedly with this, but you know Blatt is not doing well when Nate, who has been a pretty staunch supporter, is disappointed with him.
Nothing would happen until after the season, but if Blatt doesn’t at least look like he cares and has a plan then he’s not going to be around next season.
I don’t really understand Blatt anymore. Your GM goes out and gets you all these new weapons, uses up all available assets to make it 100% clear the future is now, and as the head coach you . . . say and do absolutely nothing to show you give a dogcrap about what’s happening around you.
Look at what SVG is doing with the Pistons. David, tell your guys they are the effing wall. Do something. Or go back to Europe.
Getting Shumpert, Smith, and Mozgov for Waiters and a first (and keeping our own first) feels like a steal to me.
I agree. LeBron coming back (and to a much lesser extent, Marion coming back) will solve a lot of the bench issues, too.
I also agree. There was talk about these trades being comparable to the Delonte, Wally, and Ben Wallace trades back in 2008. Comparable maybe, but these trades are better I’d say. I think Shumpert is going to be the perfect complement to Irving, he’s exactly the kind of player Irving needs to play next to. And here’s to hoping Mozgov’s presence helps Love out, like Pekovic did. It’s pretty impressive that Griff was able to address the team’s needs with such precision and so decisively.
Also Wally had had two ankle surgeries, Delonte was even more of a head case than J.R. and Ben Wallace was 32.
It won’t feel like a steal until they start winning games and become a cohesive unit. Which (as you’ve correctly said Cols) won’t happen until LBJ is back. Until then, it’s sort of like bidding on an abandoned storage locker on Storage Wars. You don’t know what you’ve got until you see the whole thing uncovered.
Miller is shooting 36% from three this year. He had one game this year in which he shot something like 7/8 from three. Other than that he’s been awful. His career average is almost 41%. Jones has been a bit closer to his average. It would be nice to have a young athletic guy at that spot. Of all the oldies, Marion’s been the most effective. He’s not a great 3 point shooter, but at least he gets rebounds, steals and points on cuts to the basket.
If millet and jones could hit some open shots that’s all we need them to do. The hope is they figure it out by playoff time. Otherwise we are set. A nice starting five. A nice bench once Shump comes back and delly can never be heard from again.
One hopes he’s like Battier for the Heat a couple of years ago (or Miller himself for the Heat a couple of years ago) where he is fairly wretched in the regular season to the point the fans are begging to have him waived, then goes nuts in the playoffs and actually is an important part of the title run. One hopes.
Fun game. Mozgov looked great. I’m a believer. Miller and jones have to knock down some of those threes. Where did their shooting go? Paging Ray allen…
As for the naysayers. If you watched this team last night you have to be impressed. Once lebron and Shump come
Back, look the eph out.
#iStandWithCols -> bring in Ray Allen. This team desperately needs some off-ball movement and “automatic” 3-point shooting. MMiller and JJones not getting it done.
I just hope LeBron is not going to put weird crony capitalism like signing Jones and Miller and maxing out TT ahead of what is best for the team . . . there is this uneasy ambiguity about whether LBJ really wants to bring Cleveland a title or if he just thinks Gilbert is the softest touch for Lebron the mogul’s post-career investments, which the Heat wouldn’t have bought into. I truly think Lebron thinks he can do both without compromising the product on the floor, but he definitely is trying to balance both interests which makes things tricky.
I don’t care if Lebron is the reason we sign guys. It keeps him here and gives this cavs team hope. Without lebron you also lose like be and are stuck with kyrie and scrubs. Again.
You miss my point, but that’s your thing I suppose.
I don’t think Ray Allen looks at the Cavs current predicament and says to himself “Now THAT’s a team I wanna join!” right now. They’re going to have to jell and become a cohesive unit that starts winning games again soon, otherwise there’s about a dozen other teams that have a better situation for Ray Ray.
Yup. If Ray Allen plays this season, it will be for a team he believes can win the championship. In other words, not Cleveland.
Ehh. Their grit was impressive but the Cavs’ play continues to be sloppy on both ends of the floor. They allowed GS to shoot 50% and continue to show little ball movement on offense. The Cavs had 13 assists to 35! for GS. Coming into this season most thought this team would dominate on the glass and three point shooting. Neither has proven true. Hated the Miller signing and hate it even more now. Guy is done as an NBA rotation player on a contender. If he can’t shoot he provides nothing else of use. James Jones at least has… Read more »
Miller and jones aren’t the reason we lost. We lost because james is injured. He won’t be injured for the playoffs. Which is why we will win the east.
Cols your pervasive positivity is striking, almost cult-like. I just imagine you regarding LeBron like the squeaky toys here talk about the Claw: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9t5ZqeHcYk
If I ever saw you on the street I’d point and say I’m a fan of the Cavs, but THAT guy is a FAN of the Cavs. Not that it’s a bad thing, there’s probably some correlation between success and obstinate persistence.
Enjoyed this recap Tom. You can weave excellent tweets into it to further illustrate your own points. Nice touch My wife joked with me that watching this game was way past my bed time so maybe the cavs aren’t giving the game away. It was nice to see motivation from the guys but I want a fire under blatt to inspire a fairer officiating. In Europe he had an electric presence. At these the video highlight I saw on YouTube indicated as much. Honestly I anticipated a loss in an extravagant and self indulgent manner but got 45 minutes of… Read more »
Yeah wordpress changed at some point this year to allow you to just copy a tweet’s URL and paste it. Super simple. It auto-sizes it and everything. In the past I would take screenshots and then upload them and it was always a pain dealing with resolution issues. So it’s an easy way to add to the recaps and it sort of proves that I didn’t just make stuff up (haha).
Dont like to Talk about the refs, but was klove fouled obviously on 3 important low post plays??? Did i miss something? Is he a player, that usually get no whistles because of his supposed soft Image? ??
There was a sequence where J.R. Smith jumped for a floater and on his way down he barely clipped someone on the Warriors (probably Draymond Green) and they called him for a charge. On the next play Mo Speights bulldozed right into Mike Miller before passing, sending him flying. no call. Kevin Love definitely got hit on the arm a few times down low. Also, early in the 1st quarter Mozgov received a pass and did a pump fake+step before Draymond Green literally jumped on top of him. I’ve seen that move a hundred times and 99 times out of… Read more »
I think this is one of the risks of hiring a European coach. In most European sports (except soccer), referees are respected. Badgering refs to gain an advantage is very much an American thing. I don’t think he really has it in him to “take one for the team” in terms of a technical.
Great recap Tom! As always, the additional tweets are fun to see. My favorite was the Timo[edited]-you-I’m-dunking-it Mozgov. Just awesome. As much as it’s annoying to see this team slump closer and closer to the .500 team they are right now, it was also heartening to see both the new guys make such an impact on this game. Without JR and to some degree the Mule, this game is over by halftime. So, instead of a blowout early, they at least held on until there was about 5 minutes left in the game. I’m not quite sure why the ball… Read more »
Yeah, this team was supposed to dominate in the fast break and in rebounding. Fast break points have been hard to come by and they’ve not cleaned up the glass the way I envisioned. I’ve been most disappointed with Kevin Love this season. He just seems so soft right now. Can’t stop anyone on defense, and he can’t impose his will around the basket. Lately he’s been gun-shy around the arc. He’s still a good defensive rebounder, but I expected him to be a stronger, more savvy player. I notice about once a game he has no shot clock awareness… Read more »
Yeah, I can’t help but think that if the Cavs could have worked out a three way the past summer where they got Draymond, David Lee and Harrison Barnes plus a 1st (which I understood to be GSW’s best offer for Love) it wouldn’t have been the worst thing.
The longer this season goes on the more I think, “Wow. LeBron is a really crappy GM.”
Speaking of no shot clock awareness, there was one time where KLove was backing a defender down, just plodding and plodding, and the shot clock expires and he didn’t even have his head up. A shot was not even attempted or even attempted to be attempted. That is egregious. Don’t remember the last time I’ve seen someone so oblivious to the shot clock. Love seems out of his element
Haha flagrant foul from his teammates in the locker room. Something, anything, for the love of god.
This doesn’t necessarily bother me, but I’m curious as to why my repeating of the profanity in the Mozgov tweet got edited out when it still exists in Tom’s recap. Would it have been different if I had put quotes around it and sourced it from the above? Like I said, not annoyed by it, just curious as to what the reasoning behind it is.
I don’t know. I didn’t even notice the original until you pointed it out. I’m guessing Nate the editor wanted to keep it clean (which is my policy as well)
Yes, Quite. Tom Probably shouldn’t have linked to it. I thought it was asterisked in the original tweet. One of the things we have to do to keep with ESPN standards is keep the language PG.
Got it. Sorry for repeating it. I’ll keep it clean from now on
I agree. I think a lot of people mentally added his 25+ PPG and 12+ RPG and got excited, but failed to account for the fact that he wouldn’t put up those numbers as a Cavalier when his usage rate went down. Unfortunately, he doesn’t compensate with things like smart defensive plays.
Thanks for the recap, Tom. I enjoy reading the recaps at CTB which are generally considered and well constructed. It is always interesting to compare the small biases each writer has. Certainly they are far better than those at Fear the Sword. The comments are generally better than at FTS which are in turn infinitely better than the drivel at Cleveland.com. Having had the rare opportunity to watch a couple of Cavs games in a row and in full I thought I might supply some comments. JR Smith – it appears that he is Dion 2.0. Today was an on… Read more »
Yeah I’m with you – Delly is being asked to do too much. He’s good for a few minutes of burn here and there but they’re putting him out there and the Cavs don’t have enough offensive firepower for him to strictly exist as a 3-D guy. He did defend Harden well. He seems to do a nice job on bigger guards, but gets burned by the super-quick ones.
I love rooting for Delly, but his limitations are definitely being exploited. He isn’t efficient as a high usage player, and he needs to get with a trainer to figure out how to get his shot off in traffic — at least be a threat to finish around the basket. I don’t see it being an athleticism problem as much as a confidence problem. Want to see him turn it around, but right now this team needs another guard. Would like to see Seth Curry on a couple ten days, just to try him out.
Forgot to add, Justin Holiday was the “sub-fuego” sub of the game.