Coup’s Takeaways: Cavaliers Have the Answers As They Take 3-0 Series Lead

Entering Game 3 there had been two distinct sections of this series.

There was the first half of Game 1, when Cleveland was getting just about any look they wanted. Then there were the following six quarters when Miami’s defense sunk Cleveland’s Shot Quality – the tangible, statistical version of it – and forced them to operate with tough shots.

The Cavaliers offense being what it was, they still made plenty of those tough shots. But for all the displays of shotmaking, the rhythm and tempo of the games were being played a bit more to Miami’s tempo.

Game 3, then, was a reversion to those opening quarters of Game 1. Miami hit first, Bam Adebayo shot out of a cannon as he and Kel’el Ware made a couple threes while Cleveland (without Darius Garland, out with a toe injury) missed a few open ones, but the Cavaliers soon took control. We don’t need to detail every beat of it, just know that the run to end the first quarter was 27-5, Miami dealing with a serious bout of turnoveritis, and that run continued into the second.

Two threes later, it was 39-20, Cleveland. While their shooting caught up, this was not Game 2 when the Cavaliers were on a record setting pace from outside. In fact, it was Miami’s shooting, hovering between 45 and 50 percent from the arc, keeping the score relatively close while the Cavaliers passed their way into one paint look, one dunk, after another.

At halftime, Miami had 11 turnovers and the Cavaliers were up 32-8 on points in the paint, 62-42 overall, with Jarrett Allen’s 16 points on 7-of-7 shooting a prime example of that. The underplayed part of Game 2 on Miami’s side was that it was their best game of the season on two-pointers. Through two quarters of Game 3, they were only 3-of-12 on non-rim attempts inside the arc, Cleveland clearly rededicated to meeting the ball higher on the drive and cutting off everything they could.

Cold stretch from both sides early in the third, Miami eating into the lead a little bit as the Cavaliers missed at the rim and the arc. Those minutes gave the HEAT some defensive momentum, Donovan Mitchell down to 2-of-11 from the field, the lead down to 15 on a corner triple from Ware. Back to 20 about a minute later, even with Cleveland’s perimeter percentages dwindling, all those floaters from Game 2 gone absent for the HEAT.

More threes for Miami kept them within reasonable distance, back up to 50 percent from the arc, Bam Adebayo taking a hard fall as his legs were taken out while contesting a shot at the rim. The deep zones offered hope of a run, though fouls started to mount on the other end as Cleveland finished off the quarter at the line. Cleveland up, 88-64, going into the fourth.

It didn’t get much better from there, Miami trading two-pointers at best, and there was no drama left as both sides pulled with starters with about five minutes left. Cleveland takes it, 124-87, and the 3-0 series lead.

It’s stating the obvious, but Cleveland’s offense was one of the best in league history, at least as far as the regular season goes, for a reason.

No Darius Garland. Donovan Mitchell well below his usual pace for much of the night. The threes rather inconsistent despite solid looks. But Cleveland kept chugging along by finding the areas that work.

We’ve talked about it all year. For many years, really. Miami’s defense, at its core, is one designed to limit rim attempts. So when the Cavaliers started getting into the paint so consistently after the first few minutes of the first, a team built on the extra pass finding Jarrett Allen (22 points on nine shots) with all those extra passes, you would have been right to have your radar up. Then, as lineups shifted and both teams dipped into their rotation, it was De’Andre Hunter (21 points on eight shots) – probably the most underrated move at the trade deadline – posting up the mismatches he could find, steadying the minutes without Mitchell on the floor with paint attacks and free-throws. Then it was Ty Jerome, picking up from his late run in Game 1, offering supplemental offense, or Max Strus drawing Miami’s attention as he ran off screens.

Such are Cleveland’s options, plentiful both on paper and in practice. This has been a Shot Quality series in many ways, but no matter what edge Miami has gained there the Cavaliers have found the makes, their Game 3 Offensive Rating of 137.8 on part with their performance in this series.

This was not a game for silver linings, and as such we will not effort to offer them. Miami has turned the dials and adjusted the knobs, making the changes that they could reasonably make and coming out early in both Games 2 and 3 with a superior level of physicality, it just hasn’t mattered. Cleveland is not yet a proven postseason team, having not advanced past the second round with this particular group, and they’ve approached this series like a team both with something to prove and – evident as you listen to coach Kenny Atkinson – a respect for the HEAT as a team you don’t take likely. In short, Miami has offered a test that the Cavaliers are passing.

Miami has a monumental task ahead of them, the only possible option left to become the first team to ever come back from a 3-0 deficit in a seven-game series.

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By ML Staff. Courtesy of NBA.