Recap: Milwaukee 108, Cleveland 105 (or, the game of what-ifs)

Cleveland went to Milwaukee and battled back from an 11 point deficit with 6:33 to go, and forced overtime. Then, down four with two minutes left, they ended up in double overtime where they went up by three before falling to the Bucks. If any one of a dozen things had gone differently, the Cavs would have won.  There were more what-ifs in this game than missed Cavalier free throws (and that’s a lot). Everyone had their share of regrets.

LeBron James: In 44 MVP minutes, LeBron scored 37, grabbed 12 boards (four offensive), blocked three shots, and dished five dimes. He looked spry, and his “back issues” appear to be a thing of the past. LeBron’s jumper was efficient too. He was 5-11 from three. The King was everywhere on offense and defense at the end of regulation and in the overtimes. At the end of the first OT, Bayless had managed to get by Matthew Dellavedova and looked to be about to score a game-winning layup before LeBron appeared from out of nowhere to obliterate it(click for video). But what if James had hit just one more free throw?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dQBe9l9eQE

LBJ was 6-12 on freebies. Even a single make might have won the game in regulation. An extra free throw in either one of the overtimes would have changed the calculus too. And LeBron’s seven turnovers were a part of 20 the Cavs had on the night. There was a lot of lazy passing and needle threading going on when simple ball movement would have had better results. What if LeBron hadn’t settled for a step-back 20-foot brick at the end of the first overtime? What if LeBron had boxed out MCW on this tip slam at the end of the first half or Greg Monroe on the Bucks’ final possession of the game? The Cavs were down three and needed a stop and a time out, but Greg got the O-Board and sealed the game. Did LeBron do a poor job of boxing out (as he sometimes does)? It’s hard to find fault, but even LeBron fails to take advantage of every opportunity.

Mo Williams had his worst game in his second stint as a Cavalier. It wasn’t so much the four points on 2-8 shooting, or the three turnovers, it was the fact that he played bullfighter defense for three and a half quarters. Mo was consistently beaten on dribble penetration by Michael Carter-Williams and Jarryd Bayless, and failed to close out on a couple of crucial Greivis Vasquez threes. I can live with the physical shortcomings that come with age, but Mo seemed to ignore the scouting report. He failed to go under the screen against MCW. Until the dude proves he can shoot, there’s absolutely no reason to chase the 2014 rookie of the year over a screen, which Mo did several times early on. Even when he did go under, Bucks guards were blowing by Mo when they came off the ball screen, getting to the rim easily. It set up easy opportunities for the Bucks and their big men all night. When Mo’s not scoring, his defense makes him a net negative.

Kevin Love had a fantastic first three quarters, scoring 22 points. Then he notched only one point in the fourth and in the two overtimes. He did grab 14 rebounds for the game, and helped execute a couple fantastic buckets for LeBron, including this one where he chipped Giannis just enough on the hand-off screen to free LeBron.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ohsGgr4JU4

But Love also went up weakly on crucial shot attempt down low in the first overtime, and got stuffed by MCW. That missed bucket was probably a game winner. Love played center in the Cavs super small lineup that dominated crunch time and the two OTs. The Cavs failed to set him up consistently behind the three-point line, but Love missed when he did get the ball late. His two free-throw misses loomed large too. There was a lot of teeth gnashing on the live thread about Love being “soft.”

Richard Jefferson was tremendous: coming off the bench to the tune of 14 points in 39 minutes (you read that last number right) despite an ankle inury. RJ went 3-6 from three, 5-10 from the floor, and had this gorgeous and-1 reverse layup to cut the lead to nine midway through the fourth. But, of course, he missed the free throw and was 1-3 from the stripe for the night. Jefferson also looked like he gave up on an inbounds play when the Cavs were down six in the first overtime. Unable to find anyone, RJ threw this bad pass that commenter Arch Stanton dubbed, “the double OT, b2b, I give up pass.” (In truth, Middleton made a pretty nice play to deflect the ball).

J.R. Smith sort of broke out of  his slump. He had a couple big shots late, including an unexpected triple to cut the deficit from six to three with 27 seconds left. As a couple commenters noted, J.R. kept his head in the game and had a solid floor game despite shooting 4-14, including 9 rebounds, and two blocks that were both spectacular.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4PGZ7EXy74

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4toYPGO_LBk

Matthew Dellavedova played good defense, and if you could combined him with Mo, you’d have the perfect player. The Bucks consistently isolated Bayless on Delly late, and Delly held his own and the Cavs got the stop every time (though one was due to LeBron’s ridiculous block). But despite leading the team in assists with seven, Delly was 0-3 from the floor with four turnovers.

Tristan Thompson: It’s hard not to think “he got paid $84 million for this?” Six points and four rebounds in 24 minutes… TT’s game check was $174,390.24. Don’t start mathing. You’ll be disappointed with the results.

Timofey Mozgov was 1-5 from the floor, but 6-6 from the free throw line (the only Cav who shot over 67%). He also added three blocks in his 15 minutes. He didn’t see the floor much late as the Cavs went with their small lineup of Mo, RJ, JR, LJ, and Kevin Love. The Cavs could have used Timo’s D late, and perhaps he’d have helped control the rebounds.

David Blatt made some interesting choices. It’s hard to find fault with the small-ball lineup that kept the Cavs competitive late. And David drew up some great in-bounds plays that led to easy baskets thoughout the game. But the Cavs seem to be unprepared for inbounds situations that don’t come out of a timeout. The turnover that R.J. committed in the second OT seemed indicative of the Cavs not being prepared for those types of situations. Blatt was uninvolved in the Game’s most controversial play, but several of his assistants were.

The Officials mostly called a good game. But at the end of the first overtime, after LeBron’s block on Jarryd Bayless, the Cavs had 7.4 seconds to get the ball up the floor against a “relaxed” Bucks defense. According to LeBron, the plan was “if we get a stop, then go ahead and go, because they might expect us to call a timeout.” Unfortunately, most of the Cavs bench called a timeout (ESPN’s David McMEnamin reports).

According to the NBA rulebook, a timeout can be granted only to either the head coach or one of the players checked into the game when the ball is dead or in control of the team making the request…

A video replay showed at least five members of the Cavs — Kevin Love, Mo Williams, assistant coaches Jim Boylan and Larry Drew, as well as athletic trainer Stephen Spiro — all signaling for timeout from the bench after LeBron James blocked Jerryd Bayless’ layup attempt with 9.9 seconds remaining in overtime and the score tied 96-96.

No one on the floor nor coach Blatt called timeout, but head official Marc Davis granted a timeout and offered this lame double talk to explain himself.

I blew the whistle with 7.4 seconds because I was in my action refereeing the play, and off to the side I heard Cleveland’s bench ask for a timeout… I granted them the timeout, at which I looked at the head coach David Blatt and realized that he hadn’t asked for the timeout. [I] made an inadvertent whistle, which allowed the offensive team to call a timeout, and, in fact, they wanted a timeout and asked for a timeout.

As David Blatt noted post-game, “Look, we all make mistakes, but that’s a bad mistake.” Unfortunately, David Blatt’s bench was complicit in calling timeouts behind his back (again) and their ignorance of the Cavs’ plan was a big communication issue. What if Cleveland had been able to rush the ball up the court? Who knows what would have happened.

Had Cleveland just made one of their missed free throws (17-27), or just boxed out on one more defensive rebound, they might have won this one. The Bucks flushed at least two tip slams and grabbed 15 offensive rebounds overall. Had Cleveland not given up 26 points on 21 team turnovers, they might have prevailed, too. What if just one more person could have scored?

What hurts worse than the loss is the fact that Cleveland gave a big boost of confidence to a 4-5 Bucks squad that is now sitting at .500. Greg Monroe(16 points, 17 boards) and John Henson (3 blocks in 21 minutes) are gonna do what they do, but Greivis Vasquez (13 points 4-8 from the field) got out of his slump, Chris Middleton (3 huge steals) started playing up to his contract, and Jabari Parker (12 points) had some enormous dunks to boost his confidence too. The Cavs played to MCW’s (17 points, four dies) strengths instead of forcing him to be a jump-shooter. Cleveland will regret giving the Bucks a shot in the arm, both in the standings, and possibly in this year’s playoffs. You never want to let an inferior team think they can beat you. If you do, they might start considering the what-ifs.