Tonight, a brief note about psychology.
For the tenth time in the past 11 games (including the playoffs), the Cavs beat Atlanta. For the third time this season, the Cavs beat Atlanta despite the Hawks getting a lead during the fourth quarter. For the first time this season, the Cavs beat Atlanta despite:
- Not only missing both Shaq & Varejao, but also…
- Still massacring Atlanta on the boards (+14 DRB, +5 ORB, +19 TRB)
- Shooting a dismal 41.3% FG
- Laboring to a weak 14 team assists
- Shooting only 31.6% 3P
- Losing the turnover battle (-3)
During the final minutes of the broadcast, Hubie Brown and Jon Barry discussed the eerie similarity between this contest and the teams’ previous two match-ups this year. Hubie’s take was that the Hawks have to feel good about themselves if they match up with the Cavs in the playoffs, because those first 3.5 quarters establish that they have the talent and the ability to compete. All they have to do is “clean up the 4th quarter” to start getting some Ws.
I don’t say this often, but I completely disagree with Hubie’s perspective on this issue.
Saying that the only thing a team has to do is clean up the fourth quarter is, to me, a little like saying that the only thing you have to do to sleep with the hottest girl in the bar is get her back to your bedroom. Is it true? Yes. But it’s also arguably the most difficult part of the entire equation.
Thanks to NBA TV, this is a brief, very basic snapshot of the series between these two teams since the 2008-9 season:
WINS: Cavs 10 | Atlanta 1
PPG: Cavs 97.8 | Atlanta 87.5
FG%: Cavs 47.0% | Atlanta 42.2%
REB: Cavs 42.2 | Atlanta 35.2
The Cavs swept the Hawks out of the playoffs last year. Tonight, they came out victorious despite all of the injuries and tepid play I mentioned at the beginning of the post, and despite that the Hawks were completely healthy.
The reality is that it’s entirely possible to damage a team’s psyche. At a certain point, the Hawks simply start to believe that they can’t outplay the Cavs when it matters—regardless of whether the “when” is the last 6 minutes of a regular season game or an entire playoff series. The other example that comes to mind is Game 5 of the 2007 ECF against Detroit, AKA LeBron’s 48 Special. That performance broke the Pistons mentally. Aftewards, I always believed that that particular Detroit team would never beat the Cavs in a game of consequence ever again. Game 6 backed me up, and the sweep of the Pistons in last year’s opening round of the playoffs still involved a hangover for guys like ‘Sheed, Prince, McDyess, Rip, and Maxiell.
Are the 2009-10 Hawks at that point? If not, I would argue that they’re damn close. One way to know for sure, though, will be if the Cavs go into Philips Arena and beat the Hawks on the last day of the season when LeBron and the other starters either DNP or get 1 quarter (or less) of PT. I don’t think that will happen, but even if it doesn’t, it also won’t reverse the psychological damage done by now.
So congrats to the Cavs, who didn’t just win a basketball game (and the #1 seed in the East), but also secured a distinct mental advantage over an opponent they may still see in the 2nd round of the playoffs.
-T
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