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The Cleveland Cavaliers are officially on the ropes. They were properly defeated in Game 3 by the New York Knicks and face elimination on Monday.
Let’s go over today’s losers.
LOSER – The Process
Kenny Atkinson has preached process all season. The Cavs have a plan, and they stick to it. It takes extreme circumstances to get them to stray away from that process. And sometimes, even the extreme isn’t enough.
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Josh Hart lit Cleveland up from downtown in Game 2. They continued to bet against him in Game 3. And while he didn’t bury them all over again, he did convert on a totally uncontested three in the fourth quarter that feels like a backbreaker when you just hand it to him.
Why not just play defense? Because of the process.
The numbers might tell you that leaving Hart open will work in your favor over the long run. The problem is, the playoffs are all about short sample sizes. Why would you test fate to this degree? There’s a human element and a degree of ‘rising to the moment’ that analytics can not account for. If given the choice between guarding Hart or betting on a spreadsheet, I think you should guard Hart.
That same process has led to the Cavs launching three-pointers to no avail. There’s value in an open, or even semi-open, three-point attempt. But only if those shots are falling. You don’t get brownie points for taking good shots. You get a 0-3 deficit for not adjusting.
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I’m not saying the Cavs should stop taking open threes. That would be silly. But they have no alternative. They’ve shot below 30% from deep in the series and have not found anything else to fall back on. They can’t get into the paint, they haven’t made any rotational adjustments, and they don’t get enough stops to change things.
It’s all out of whack.
Maybe this is the result of playing against a better team. I think we at least have to acknowledge the possibility that New York is flat-out better at this than the Cavs.
Still, you never want to go down without swinging. You have to throw the kitchen sink. To run into the same wall multiple seasons in a row while pointing to ‘shot…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/winners-losers-cavs-vs-knicks-025355818.html
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Publish date : 2026-05-24 02:53:00
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