Has the Cavaliers collective reached maturity? JB Bickerstaff is convinced of this. The time has come for his young group to take this final step to definitively become one of the strong leaders in the Eastern Conference.
Under the leadership of coach Bickerstaff, Cleveland went from 15th, to 13th, then 9th to fourth place in the Eastern Conference last season. After Donovan Mitchell last summer, Max Strus and Georges Niang completed the squad. Even if the hard core has only experienced one playoff series together (lost 4-1 to the Knicks), the former Grizzlies coach believes that his team is ready for the next stage.
“These are lessons to be learned. You have to go through the playoff series and the defeats, then the summer that follows, for the players to realize that this is what the coaches are talking about, these little things that count., did he declare. “I think we had that experience. So now how can we be harder to defend? How do we make teams feel like they have to hold on harder? During the regular season, we were a top pick-and-roll team. So how can we improve it and make it more dynamic? “.
Become familiar with the playoff exercise
The Cavaliers coach used the same reference to discuss the case of Evan Mobley, one of the gems on his roster, ensuring that only the experience of the playoffs will help him reach this new milestone.
“Just seeing what life is like in the trenches. The physical dimension that there was, the fact that the rules change a little, in terms of what the guys can do and what we can let play”he added. “The change from the regular season is real. It’s about playing possession by possession, trying to win four times against the same team, becoming aware of how they read your game, taking advantage of the things you learn about them and playing them more in depending on their weaknesses.
Here too, JB Bickerstaff is hopeful that Evan Mobley has learned the lesson of his first career playoff series, during which he existed too little against Julius Randle’s teammates with 9.8 points on 46% shooting.
“That’s one of the things we talked about with Evan over the summer. He’s one of those players that wants to be great, so he listens. As soon as the season ended, he was hungry for information and got to work”concluded the Cavaliers strategist.
| Shots | Rebounds | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Players | MJ | Min | Shots | 3pts | L.F. | Off | Def | Early | Pd | Bp | Int | Ct | Party | Pts |
| Donovan Mitchell | 68 | 35.8 | 48.4 | 38.6 | 86.7 | 0.9 | 3.3 | 4.3 | 4.4 | 2.6 | 1.5 | 0.4 | 2.5 | 28.3 |
| Darius Garland | 69 | 35.5 | 46.2 | 41.0 | 86.3 | 0.4 | 2.3 | 2.7 | 7.8 | 2.9 | 1.2 | 0.1 | 2.1 | 21.6 |
| Evan Mobley | 79 | 34.4 | 55.4 | 21.6 | 67.4 | 2.4 | 6.6 | 9.0 | 2.8 | 1.8 | 0.8 | 1.5 | 2.8 | 16.2 |
| Jarrett Allen | 68 | 32.6 | 64.4 | 10.0 | 73.3 | 3.3 | 6.5 | 9.8 | 1.7 | 1.4 | 0.8 | 1.2 | 2.3 | 14.3 |
| Caris Levert | 74 | 30.2 | 43.1 | 39.2 | 72.2 | 0.7 | 3.1 | 3.8 | 3.9 | 1.6 | 1.0 | 0.3 | 2.3 | 12.1 |
| Cedi Osman | 77 | 20.1 | 45.1 | 37.2 | 69.4 | 0.3 | 2.0 | 2.3 | 1.5 | 0.7 | 0.5 | 0.1 | 1.6 | 8.7 |
| Kevin Love | 41 | 20.0 | 38.9 | 35.4 | 88.9 | 1.0 | 5.8 | 6.8 | 1.9 | 1.1 | 0.2 | 0.2 | 1.6 | 8.5 |
| Danny Green | 8 | 11.9 | 50.0 | 44.8 | 100.0 | 0.3 | 1.0 | 1.3 | 0.5 | 0.9 | 0.6 | 0.4 | 1.3 | 6.5 |
| Isaac Okoro | 76 | 21.7 | 49.4 | 36.3 | 75.7 | 0.7 | 1.8 | 2.5 | 1.1 | 0.6 | 0.7 | 0.4 | 2.1 | 6.4 |
| Lamar Stevens | 62 | 18.1 | 44.8 | 31.6 | 70.2 | 0.8 | 2.6 | 3.3 | 0.5 | 0.4 | 0.4 | 0.3 | 1.3 | 5.3 |
| Ricky Rubio | 33 | 17.2 | 34.3 | 25.6 | 80.0 | 0.3 | 1.8 | 2.1 | 3.5 | 0.9 | 0.8 | 0.2 | 1.5 | 5.2 |
| Sam Merrill | 5 | 11.7 | 40.9 | 27.8 | 100.0 | 0.0 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 1.0 | 0.0 | 0.8 | 0.0 | 0.6 | 5.0 |
| Dean Wade | 44 | 20.3 | 41.2 | 35.4 | 65.2 | 0.5 | 3.0 | 3.4 | 0.8 | 0.4 | 0.6 | 0.5 | 2.0 | 4.7 |
| Raulzinho Neto | 48 | 10.5 | 51.8 | 28.6 | 91.2 | 0.2 | 0.8 | 1.0 | 1.6 | 0.5 | 0.4 | 0.1 | 1.0 | 3.3 |
| Robin Lopez | 37 | 8.1 | 64.0 | 50.0 | 77.8 | 0.6 | 0.8 | 1.4 | 0.5 | 0.7 | 0.1 | 0.2 | 1.2 | 3.0 |
| Mamadi Diakite | 22 | 8.0 | 48.0 | 33.3 | 100.0 | 0.4 | 1.0 | 1.4 | 0.4 | 0.5 | 0.2 | 0.4 | 1.2 | 2.6 |
| Isaiah Mobley | 12 | 7.0 | 42.9 | 37.5 | 100.0 | 0.3 | 1.3 | 1.7 | 0.3 | 0.1 | 0.3 | 0.3 | 0.7 | 2.6 |
| Dylan Windler | 3 | 3.5 | 66.7 | 50.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.3 | 0.3 | 0.3 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 1.7 |
