Not a bazooka but this pic comes to you via request … although my effort at fulfilling the request was tainted by the holiday season, much like the effort of the Cavs during the first 30-40 minutes of tonight’s game.
This was a fun game to watch in the living room of my parents, complete with commentary by AC, who spoke incessantly about a psychological wall that was preventing the Cavs from getting ahead of the Hawks after they fought back to within a basket in the third quarter. I thought that was silly … but hey, the Cavs were first to 100 and they won the game.
In a lot of ways, this was a game about makes and misses. Part of that was because of the Cavs weak defense in the first half, part of it was because the Hawks were shooting the ball well - just like last night’s over 9 minute drought by Atlanta had a lot to do with great defense by the Cavs and poor shooting by the Hawks. It’s always a little bit of both.
Of course the ultimate make was Andy’s 3P with 17.4 seconds left in the 4th quarter. Some times those kinds of uncomfortable shots go in and some times they don’t. Bibby missed a shot a few seconds later that certainly could have gone in after all. He’s a career 38% 3P shooter; Varejao was at 0% before that shot.
These kinds of games are a reminder of the Houston GM Daryl Morey’s assertion that good teams don’t win close games; they avoid them.
Morey’s statement makes a lot of sense, especially when you think about how good of a predictor efficiency differential is for a team’s win-loss record.
And if Boston loses tonight (as I type this, they’re down 11 in Phoenix without KG and Paul Pierce), the Cavs will have the best record in the Eastern Conference.
*Controversy Bonus*
There was a huge discrepancy in fouls (ATL: 24 PF | CLE: 15 PF) and free throws (ATL: 15 | CLE: 38). I know because Hawks fans were complaining on Twitter.
I don’t like to get into this stuff too often, but the Hoopsdata advanced stats box score shows that the Hawks took a ton of shots in the 16-23 foot range (23, 12 more than the Cavs) … just the kind of inefficient long range two pointers that don’t result in foul calls.
Not saying that’s the whole story, but it’s part of the conversation.
