The Cleveland Cavaliers were not expected to win Game One in Toronto on Tuesday after only having about two days to prepare for the top-seeded Raptors. But after Toronto allowed the Cavs to hang around for most of the game, LeBron James and company evened the score by the end of regulation and claimed an overtime victory. Now, the pressure is on the Raptors to defend home court in Game Two or face a reality in which Cleveland owns a 2-0 series lead without playing a game at home yet.
Cleveland’s going to be depending on Kevin Love to finally make an appearance in this post-season. Love has been nothing like he was in the regular season or even past playoff runs. He’s underachieved greatly while being the second option for the first time as a Cavalier in the playoffs. It’s hurting the Cavs and they won’t be able to hide his lack of production for much longer.
On the other side of the spectrum, Toronto is hoping that everything they adjusted this season can finally get them past LeBron James, who’s been the grim reaper in every Raptors playoff appearance over the last four years. Without playing as much iso-ball and featuring a stronger bench, the Raptors had to feel good about their chances this year. But a heartbreaking loss in the series opener has even themselves questioning what they can do.
Let’s take a look at the three key to a Cavaliers victory.
1. Watching For A Hot Start- Toronto is none too happy about relinquishing the home court advantage they worked for all season long in the matter of one game. That means one should expect an attempt to catch the Cavs off-guard and punch them in the mouth early with a fast start to the contest.
The one thing to keep an eye on will be how much the Raptors plan to stick with their intention to avoid playing one-on-one. It almost seems like the current strategy in place isn’t going to help Toronto at all in this series because of the moment getting bigger for their younger guys. Counting on Fred VanVleet and OG Anunoby to help take the load off of DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry is far from the best plan of stopping Cleveland. As seen in Game One, the moment was just a tad too big for VanVleet when he missed the game-tying three-point attempt.
This is a situation in which DeRozan and Lowry must look to get past their biggest hurdle since teaming up by themselves.
2. Figuring Out The Bigs Situation- Something that Cavaliers head coach Ty Lue will have to straighten out is who will be starting at the four and five spots. After Jonas Valanciunas went berzerk in the first game for Toronto with a stat line of 21 points and 21 rebounds, someone is going to have to body up on him and slow his roll.
Kevin Love has been ineffective through eight games at defending any big man presented to him. Jeff Green, though he can play the power forward position, is no match for Valanciunas, Pascal Siakim, or Jakob Poeltl. With Ante Zizic not seeing any playing time and Larry Nance Jr. looking like a shell of himself, the Cavs will have only one option to at least try to slow down Valanciunas.
Tristan Thompson is that option and he’s a darn good one. Thompson saw 26 minutes of action and put up 14 points and 12 rebounds but that isn’t nearly enough playing time for the energy-creating forward. Thompson puts an emphasis on securing rebounds at a high rate as well as creating extra possessions on the offensive end, which was one of the only things Cleveland was lacking in the first game. If he sees upwards of thirty minutes in Thursday’s contest, Cleveland should be in business.
3. Making The Free Ones Count- The little things are always magnified during the playoffs. Free throws tend to be the biggest stat category looked at over others when seeing why a team lost a close game.
Though Cleveland escaped with a victory on Tuesday, they missed six of their free throws. That simply cannot happen during the postseason, especially while on the road.
Shooting 71% from the charity stripe isn’t going to work going forward. Ironically enough, LeBron James was the worst from the line for the Cavaliers going 1-for-6. But that isn’t likely to happen again, so the team should be in good shape.
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