Recap: Pacers 102, Cavs 95 (or, You’ll Float Too!)

Halloween might have been yesterday, but what happened to Darius Garland (or his shot anyway) tonight was a downright scary sight. On the surface, this was a mostly fun and fairly hard-fought loss by the still-learning-how-to-play-together Cavaliers in a place where they’ve consistently struggled even in the best of seasons. Losing by single digits to the likely playoff-bound Indiana Pacers, even without Victor Oladipo and Myles Turner, on the road while still making it a contest for the majority of 48 minutes is still a pretty good outcome for this fledgling team.

They overcame a foul-plagued, back-to-earth performance by Tristan Thompson, a deluge of careless turnovers, a sub 37% shooting night as a team, and even a brief and rusty return of Brandon Knight to stay afloat enough to keep from being blown out. Yet it’s hard to win any game that features a horrific 11 point quarter, or a frightful 0-10 showing from your first round draft pick.

It wasn’t the goose egg itself that was most troubling about Garland’s performance… it was how he got there. I’m not sure I’d be all that concerned or annoyed if most (or all) of the attempts were from beyond the arc, especially given the range we’ve seen thus far out of the rookie shooter. Yet, only two of the misfires were of the deep variety. Instead, he was hoisting up aimless, midrange balloon-like floaters with all the trepidation of a kid trying to get his paper boat back from a scary clown in a sewer.

At least John Beilein showed enough mercy to keep him off the court during crunch time in favor of the suddenly quasi-effective Jordan Clarkson. After just 26 soul sucking minutes, all that was missing from the sad, shell-shocked kid at the end of the bench was a yellow raincoat. I tried really hard not to start calling him “Georgie,” but with each successive floater, I could see his confidence flowing away like water down a storm drain.

Other Cavs fared better, at least to start the game, and for the balance of the second half. They jumped out to a 26-17 lead in the first quarter behind the hot shooting of Kevin Love, Cedi Osman and Collin Sexton. The energy level seemed to be a holdover from Wednesday night’s game against the Bulls, as the Cavs were aggressive defenders and willing passers to find open shots. Yet, even as the first 12 minutes waned, the Pacers began to turn the screws defensively. In fact, after Cedi buried a triple with just under three minutes left in the period, Cleveland didn’t score again, and turned the ball over four times.

As brutal as the end of the first was, however, the second quarter is where the Cavs really lost this game. Outside of a couple of Clarkson buckets, the bench could seem to do nothing right. It was a rough outing for Kevin Porter Jr. after a few promising performances, as he posted a team worst -16 and often looked lost. Knight finally saw the court this season with Matthew Dellavedova away for personal reasons, and probably showed why he’s been nailed to the bench. He was 0-3 and -10 in just six minutes of hinge-squeaking action. Also, anyone who believes the Larry Nance Jr. stretch four experiment should continue needs to rewatch this painful quarter as Exhibit A for why it should not. Capping it off were at least three of the red balloon floaters from Georgie Garland.

Though the Cavs only trailed 42-37 at the half, it was clear that every point scored was going to matter in this battle of attrition with Indiana. In truth, Cleveland was only outscored by two in the second half by the Pacers… primarily because #0 seemed determined to answer the adult contemporary rock question posed by the Brothers Gibb (“How Deep Is Your Love?”), by shooting closer and closer to the logo with each successive heave.

Love so deep. ❤

📺 #CavsPacers on @FOXSportsCLE pic.twitter.com/2Gy4VguUnz

— Cleveland Cavaliers (@cavs) November 2, 2019

The big man almost had his fifth straight double double to start the season by the end of the second quarter, and wound up with a 22 point/17 rebound/4 assist line. Yet his long outlet passes were intercepted almost as often as Baker Mayfield’s have been lately, as he also led the team with six giveaways.

To be fair, the Cavs’ interior defense struggled when Tristan Thompson was out of the game… and, that was more often than Coach Beilein probably would have preferred given the big man’s foul trouble. TT got hit with a couple of ticky-tack calls, so he couldn’t be quite as aggressive as usual. Yet, he has struggled with Domanatas Sabonis in the past, and though the Pacers were without Turner in the middle, they got good mileage out of rookie big Goga Bitadze who had 10 points, nine boards and four rejections.

Despite Georgie’s Garland’s floating nightmare, his back court mate Sexton, and his replacement Clarkson helped shoot the Cavs back into the game in the second half. Though neither shot incredibly well from distance (combined 3-11), they each broke the 20 barrier with some fearless drives and timely jumpers.

Step back, baby. 🔥 #BeTheFight pic.twitter.com/DXSdusvqWA

— Cleveland Cavaliers (@cavs) November 2, 2019

.@JordanClarksons staying on the attack.#CavsPacers | #BeTheFight pic.twitter.com/XowLQRuIez

— Bally Sports Cleveland (@BallySportsCLE) November 2, 2019

There were still rough patches defensively, and Clarkson missed a triple in the final minute that would have cut Indy’s lead to three, but both showed consistent effort. They were particularly effective in the full-court press defense that Beilein chose to employ during the final 90 seconds, which begs the question of why not use it here and there throughout the game in the future?

After a hot first quarter, Osman wasn’t quite the reincarnation of Kyle Korver he resembled Wednesday night. Part of this seemed to be fewer opportunities, but also give credit to the Pacer defense which seemed to close out on him much more quickly than the Bulls did, forcing Cedi to put the ball on the floor and drive more often. In fact, the Pacers were pretty dogged in their attack of the passing lanes from the second quarter on, to prevent the Cavs from sharing the ball as freely and enticing them to make ball-handling mistakes. And, well, the Cavs complied with 16 turnovers.

Lessons And Observations

In lieu of an Evil and Genius section tonight, here are a few general takeaways given how experimental this team still is on a night to night basis:

The Cavs need to do a better job of finding and feeding the hot hand. They did this a bit with Love in the third quarter, but they could have done more to get Cedi involved, or run more plays to get Sexton, Love and Clarkson open looks in crunch time.

The defense never gave up, but also suffered when Thompson got saddled with foul trouble. Too often, the perimeter D is flimsy at best, putting undue strain on the bigs patrolling the paint. The Pacers aren’t a prolific three point shooting team, but the Cavs still struggled in letting guys run at the rim all night. The intensity is there, but it’s tough to get consistent stops when it matters with only one wing and a prayer.

As noted above… John Beilein needs to put a merciful end to the LNJ stretch four experiment. Let’s get Larry back to doing what he does best… running the bench offense from the post, crashing the boards and cutting to the hoop on PNR action.

Speed is great, but speed can also kill… possessions that is. There were plenty of opportunities for the Cavs to run in this one, but often they’d get tripped up in their haste by being careless with the basketball. Indiana is a veteran, handsy team defensively, which knows how to strip guys who are trying to do too much with the ball.

Lastly, Coach B needs to have a heart to heart with his rookie guard about his shot selection. As mentioned, it’s one thing to take an oh-fer when you’re just missing good shots that you usually take. It’s quite another to do so when heaving up tentative, ill-advised shots that are not really a part of your skill set. True, sometimes floaters and drives can build confidence if one’s outside shot is not falling… but that’s not Garland’s game at the moment. On the semi-bright side, Darius did have a couple of really nice dimes early on before his confidence completely eroded. The Cavs could use a steady distributor of the rock, even on nights when his shot isn’t falling.

But, just remember Georgie… if you clown around with floaters… you’ll float too…