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Turnovers, an early deficit, and hot outside shooting from the Oklahoma City Thunder did the Cleveland Cavaliers in on Sunday afternoon. They lost their first game in February 121-113.
The stats in the table below are taken from Cleaning the Glass.
Effective Field Goal Percentage
Offensive Rebounding Percentage
Offensive Turnover Percentage
Free Throw Rate
Cavs
55.1%, 55th percentile
31.9%, 66th percentile
17.2%, 26th percentile
15.9, 26th percentile
Thunder
61%, 84th percentile
30%, 56th percentile
16.3%, 33rd percentile
17.4, 34th percentile
Now, let’s dive into the numbers.
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The Cavs coughed it up on 37% of their possessions in the first quarter (0th percentile), leading to 17 points off turnovers. This resulted in Cleveland being down by 23 midway through the first quarter and 15 at the end of one. You can’t come out of the gates that poorly against the defending champions and expect to win on the road, regardless of who’s in the lineup.
Cleveland turned it over just seven more times in the last three quarters, but still gave up 31 points off turnovers overall. The Cavs’ giveaways were costly. This is a Thunder team that has struggled to score in the half-court without their two best offensive players. That isn’t much of an issue if you’re able to generate that many points off turnovers.
Donovan Mitchell and James Harden combined for eight turnovers. There’s context behind why they turned it over this much — mainly the minutes with the starting lineup were bad — but they simply needed to be better. It’s difficult to win games if your two best offensive players aren’t protecting the ball like they need to.
Oklahoma City outscored Cleveland by 24 points from beyond the arc. The Thunder went a scorching 21-41 (51.2%, 96th percentile) from three. Meanwhile, the Cavs couldn’t get their outside shots to fall as they went 13-39 (33.3%, 35th percentile).
The Thunder hit as many two-point shots as they did from three, 21, and did so on a worse percentage, 46.7%.
Oklahoma City tied its third-best three-point percentage in a game and tied their fourth-most threes in a game this season. This was an…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/13-stats-explain-cavs-121-220000444.html
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Publish date : 2026-02-22 22:00:00
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