The Toronto Raptors are set to open their Eastern Conference Finals series with the Cleveland Cavaliers on Tuesday. Breathe that in. It’s been a really fun month and a terrific year, and it’s not done yet.
The Cavaliers represent an enormous favorite in the series, and the Raptors will be in tough. Next to nobody outside of the commenters here are giving the Raptors much of a chance in the series, but I think the way the Raptors have played all year, and their entire identity, suggests the series will be tightly contested, if not all that long in the end. Head coach Dwane Casey is reasonably playing the expectation management game in deferring to the excellence of LeBron James and company, and he’ll have his squad buying into the underdog mentality and ready to come out swinging.
Helping matters could be that it feels like the Cavs haven’t played since Larry Hughes was still gunning. According to Elias, teams who played a postseason game after a layoff of eight or more days are 5-6 since 2000, per Mike Mazzeo (it’s been a treat to have Mazz around the team all through the playoffs; he’s very good). It would stand to reason that those teams were also mostly favorites, because you have to win a series quite promptly to get that kind of lay-off. The Cavs have done just that with back-to-back sweeps, and while Casey will take “rest over rust” in the playoffs and the siesta will surely help the Cavs in the long-run, there’s a chance they come out shaky in Game 1. As a result, this is probably Toronto’s best chance at stealing a road game in the series, something they’ll have to do to score the upset.
As a side note, please pocket your “they should have fought harder for the top seed” arguments, at least until Game 7. Did you see what Kyle Lowry looked like down the stretch and in the first round? He probably still played a little too much. And you can’t just say “if Raptors win Game X, they have home court” – there’s a butterfly effect that would have altered how Cleveland approached the end of their season, too. Now hardly seems the time for hand-wringing. I’m more cautious than most with minutes and workloads and injuries, so I get that I’m maybe in the minority not caring about home court here, because they got here. That was the goal. And to be perfectly honest, I’m not sure home-court advantage is going to be a factor here.
You can check out a full series preview with Justin Rowan of Fear the Sword here, and Will and Zarar teed up the series on their Game 7 reaction podcast. And, shameless plug, my part-time TV work continued post-Game 7 to reflect and then begin teeing this series up. What follows is as much a continued series preview as a game preview, since it’s Game 1 and all.
The game tips off at 8:30 p.m. from Quicken Loans Arena. ESPN has the game in the U.S., with Mike Breen, Jeff Van Gundy, Mark Jackson, and Doris Burke on the call, while Sportsnet has the Canadian broadcast and TSN 1050 has radio rights. Scott Foster, Sean Corbin, and Jason Phillips are the officials.
Setting up the series
What happened in the season series: The Raptors won 103-99 at home, lost 122-100 on the road, and won 99-97 at home. Lowry was terrific in those games, and the final meeting included one of the greatest regular season moments in franchise history (and boy, Lowry sure is assaulting a lot of Raptors’ “best” lists). There’s not a ton to be gleaned from these games, however well Toronto played at home – Kyrie Irving, Matthew Dellavedova, and Iman Shumpert all missed a game, Channing Frye and DeMarre Carroll missed two, and Jonas Valanciunas played in two. The Cavs have also fundamentally changed since.
One thing’s clear, though – this series will be played at a slow pace. Both teams were in the bottom three for pace in the regular season, have slowed it down even more in the playoffs, and their games against each other were even slower than either team played individually. And hey, if you want to take 2-1 as a positive, by all means, do so, but the Cavs had the far better differential and their starting lineup cruised (and they’ll tighten up their rotation for this series).
What’s happened since: The primary change from the regular season is that these are now the playoff Cavaliers. After an adjustment period, the team settled in under Ty Lue, and any reserves James was saving have been put to use now that the games matter more. The Cavaliers have eyes on a title, and the regular season meant little to them, so it’s difficult to extrapolate too much. They also really didn’t tip their hand about how they may approach Toronto defensively, though that would have been thrown up in the air due to Valanciunas’ absence (at least early), anyway. The Cavs are still just a decent defense, but their offense has lifted to another plane of existence – they rocked the Hawks, the No. 2 defense in basketball, and rained threes, a massive problem for Toronto that they’re yet to correct. Cleveland has opened things up with a spread attack and shooters everywhere, and that creates a lot of really difficult decisions for a defense.
On the Raptors’ side, they seemed to find their footing in Game 7 against Miami. If the team plays like that, this is going to be one hell of a series. The Raptors haven’t been at that level consistently, but there’s some evidence to suggest they can maintain it. Lowry’s shot is back to accompany his high-level play in other areas, the team has gotten comfortable with Bismack Biyombo at center, they have the ability to switch a lot on the defensive end if they so choose, and Patrick Patterson has emerged as a pretty legitimate defender against power-three types. Keep an eye on Patterson in this series – not only is he paramount for guarding James-Kevin Love pick-and-rolls and to punish Cleveland loading up off the weak side, he was also a massive plus-30 in three meetings with Cleveland (while the team was a minus-46 with him on the bench).
Key to the game: This thing might start and end with 3-point defense. The Raptors’ core defensive identity involves protecting the paint first and trying to close out on shooters after that initial goal is achieved. The result was the Raptors ranking 29th in 3-point defense, and Cleveland shot better against Toronto than they did against any other team from outside. Cleveland’s also ratcheted up the volume of their threes and their marksmanship, and while that’s a high-variance strategy, it also plays into Toronto’s biggest weakness. And this is all without Cleveland unleashing their deadly James-Love-Channing Frye frontcourt for more than a few minutes here and there.
What the answer for this may be is unclear – you can only stop so many things, and the Raptors are probably still going to prioritize the rim. That will require individual defenders to do a better job at the point of attack so the Raptors can send less help from their weak-side zone, and it’s going to require a ton of effort and discipline from those guarding shooters. Guys like Cory Joseph, Terrence Ross, and Norman Powell, however much they play, are going to have to fly around the perimeter and really fight back in transition. There’s also an enormous load on the shoulders of DeMarre Carroll, who will likely be trusted with the James matchup without much help so that his teammates can stay closer to home on their men.
At the other end, Toronto needs to attack, full stop. Tristan Thompson is a quality defender, as are Iman Shumpert, James, and a few others, but the Raptors’ don’t have the 3-point shooting to match up bombing from outside. The Cavs allow a high percentage at the rim, and the Raptors employ two of the very best in the league at getting there. Cleveland faces some tough defensive choices when Lowry and DeMar DeRozan share the floor, because Irving isn’t a good enough defender to keep Lowry in check and pulling Shumpert or J.R. Smith off of DeRozan to check Lowry means James can’t rest on Carroll. James is surely up for the DeRozan challenge, but it’s not as if Carroll can just be ignored, as he’s a great shooter and an adept off-ball cutter. The Raptors should have an advantage somewhere one-through-three, at least so long as Irving’s on the court. Dellavedova is a little feistier and more game defensively, and he quite annoyingly improved a lot this season. He’ll have the Lowry assignment whenever he’s on the floor.
The Cavs will almost surely trap pick-and-rolls, leveraging Thompson’s quickness, agility, and ability to switch on to guards and loading up off of Biyombo. Biyombo’s awareness and finishing have been stellar in the playoffs, but those are tough passes for guards to make and Cleveland will send help to bump and get in under Biyombo’s hands to try to force turnovers or make Biyombo pass. Aggressively trapping might not be how the Cavs want to play, but it’s their best shot at slowing Lowry now that he has his jumper back and can kill Cleveland for going under screens (Cleveland will probably concede mid-range jumpers to DeRozan on his off-ball actions, meanwhile). The counter to Cleveland trapping would be to make Patterson the primary high screener, putting Love in the pick-and-roll (or forcing Cleveland to have Love guard Biyombo, which they’re maybe fine with). That 1-4-5 setup will be fluid, and expect the Raptors to lean heavily on their dual-screener sets to try to exploit Love (or Frye) as much as they can.
Reasons for optimism: Well, there’s the fact that Cleveland’s been off since Kid Cudi last released a good track, that Lowry is looking very KLOE of late, that he has a winnable matchup at the point, and that the Raptors played their most complete game of the playoffs on Sunday. They also played Cleveland well all season and thrive in slower, grind-it-out games where they chew clock, get back in transition, and try to force an opponent into late-clock shots (Cleveland’s good at those, but it’s still preferable to their transition game). Cleveland also isn’t an elite defensive team, grading out closer to Miami than Indiana (they were essentially equal with Toronto, there and in a lot of areas). And as good as Cleveland’s been at 8-0 in the postseason, six of those games went down to the wire, and the Raptors love those toughness-before-talent scenarios.
And as far as slowing James, or at least making life difficult on him, goes, Carroll fares pretty well. Yes, James averaged nearly a triple-double against the Hawks in the playoffs last year, but look at how inefficiently James scored in that series, and in the regular-season meetings between the two over the last two years. That’s at least encouraging that the Raptors can survive 35-38 minutes without sending too much help Carroll’s way.
Reasons for pessimism: The Cavs employ James, maybe still the best player in the world when fully engaged in a playoff atmosphere. They have a pair of All-Star caliber scorers around him, and the rest of the roster is fleshed out with quality players who have begun thriving in their roles. The 3-point shooting is just a massive, massive concern for a defense that’s struggled there all year. Cleveland can also neutralize one of Biyombo’s biggest assets with Thompson’s comparably obscene rebounding (he has the highest offensive rebounding rate in the playoffs). Cleveland was good all year, and now they’re very good. They move the ball incredibly well, their starting lineup has become death to opponents, and there aren’t many places to comfortably hide a poor defender against. The Cavaliers are, to be frank, the best team in the East, and it’s going to take a whale of an effort and maybe a little luck to knock them from that pedestal.
Looooot of green beyond the arc in the Cavs’ regular-season shot chart vs. the Raptors: pic.twitter.com/X9sb1bdZnt
— Dan Devine (@YourManDevine) May 16, 2016
Series Prediction: Cavaliers in 5. I know. You have no idea how difficult it was to turn from what happened Sunday night and how that felt to immediately getting into analysis, studying game tape, and struggling to justify picking the Raptors or even just a long series. I love the heck out of this team and think they’re going to give the Cavaliers a really good fight, but there just aren’t a lot of areas the Raptors are better in, and I think the regular season malaise has decidedly lifted from the Cavs. I will say that I think Game 1 is their best shot at stealing a road game, and because I think they’ll take one at home, that could serve to extend the series to six.
I know some of you will probably be mad I’m not taking the Raptors, but that’s the tough balance between fan/blogger/analyst/whatever you call what I do. I would be thrilled to be wrong and take the told-you-sos that come with it. Seriously, nothing would make me happier.
Game 1 updates
Jonas Valanciunas (ankle) will not play and sounds doubtful for Game 2, and maybe even beyond. Otherwise, both sides are rolling healthy, save for some minor ailments on Toronto’s end (DeRozan’s thumb, Carroll’s knee and ankle).
Raptors projected rotation
PG: Kyle Lowry, Cory Joseph, (Delon Wright)
SG: DeMar DeRozan, T.J. Ross, (Norman Powell)
SF: DeMarre Carroll, James Johnson, (Bruno Caboclo)
PF: Patrick Patterson, (Luis Scola)
C: Bismack Biyombo, Jason Thompson, Lucas Nogueira, (Jonas Valanciunas)
There are two key rotation questions facing Toronto: Who guards James when Carroll’s not on the floor, and who is the third big man in the rotation?
For the former, I actually think you all may get your wish and see some James Johnson in this series, particularly if James is playing the four for stretches. Patterson makes the most sense as the second man on James, but his minutes will overlap enough with Carroll’s that someone else will probably have to do spot duty, and Johnson makes the most sense. The Raptors tried Ross in that role some in the regular season, but he’s giving up a lot of size. Powell did a commendable job on the much larger Paul George, but he also fell out of the rotation against Miami (and he might be a better option as an Irving-cooler, since Joseph struggled with that matchup this year). So, yeah, I see Johnson spot minutes, and I think the Raptors will have to live with DeRozan on James for possessions here and there, too, if they want to get away with playing two point guards a lot (and I think they will).
As for the latter, I’d guess Thompson has Casey’s trust more than Nogueira because of how much range the non-Thompson bigs have on Cleveland’s side. Nogueira makes plays but the mistakes he’s prone to would be killer against an offense this good, and Casey will probably prefer the steadier, albeit lower-upside option. I think the role will be fluid, though, as Nogueira offers more on offense than Thompson can. Casey has to hope Biyombo and Patterson are ready for huge minutes again. (And no, I don’t think Scola factors in much. He’s been sitting so long and it’s not a particularly good matchup for him.)
Cavaliers projected rotation
PG: Kyrie Irving, Matthew Dellavedova, (Mo Williams)
SG: J.R. Smith, Iman Shumpert, (Dahntay Jones), (Jordan McRae)
SF: LeBron James, Richard Jefferson
PF: Kevin Love, (James Jones)
C: Tristan Thompson, Channing Frye, (Timofey Mozgov), (Sasha Kaun)
As the favorite, the Cavaliers are faced with fewer tough decisions. They have the luxury of coming out and playing their game, forcing their style upon Toronto, and then adjusting if it’s not working. They have some tough calls in how they line up defensively to help Irving on Lowry, and this could wind up a big Dellavedova series as a result. Given they can slide James to the four and Love/Frye to the five, Timofey Mozgov is probably shelved until Valanciunas is ready (and maybe still then). The Cavs are probably set at nine, and Jefferson’s involvement could be scaled back to make it an eight-man rotation if need be.
In terms of specific lineup iterations, the Cavs really only used four groups for big minutes over the first two rounds, and their starters are the only group they’ve used in all eight games. With the cushion of talent, Lue flew by the seat of his pants with rotation patterns, and that flexibility should come in handy. It may also come with the minor cost of unfamiliarity, and Lue will probably want to settle on something more consistent at some point. What groups Cleveland toys with is one of the more interesting subplots of Game 1.
The line
Game 1: Cavaliers -10.5
Series: Cavaliers -1200
I think the Game 1 line is pretty off. I can’t see the Raptors coming out flat or the Cavs coming out on fire given where each team is coming from over the last few days. The Raptors may be a little tired, I guess, but this has never been a team for which it’s safe to bet on them getting blown out. As for the series price, well, that’s an implied win probability of about 92 percent, or about infinity times more respect than CBS is giving the Raptors.
LOL @ CBS, c’mon fam. #WeTheOther pic.twitter.com/nQBbnfcZXU
— Scott Johnson (@_scottjohnson) May 17, 2016
Again, we come back to the Raptors being major underdogs. That’s fine, reasonable, understandable, and so on. It’s also probably exactly where the Raptors want to be, bet against once more, pressure off, and with whiteboard material. I really don’t think the Raptors are going to lay down and die. And I hope I’m wrong about them just keeping it close rather than winning the opening salvo.
Cavaliers 103, Raptors 98
