MVN - Most Valuable Network

LeBron: “I can’t play no worse than I did last night”

LeBron James said that on Wednesday, a day after what might arguably be the most dreadful playoff game of his career.

There were 16 missed shots compared to just two that found the bottom of the net. The final field goal percentage read “11.1 percent.” He finished with 12 points, which was more than he did in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals last year, but eight of them came at the charity stripe.

Let’s put it this way: Wally freaking Szczerbiak finished with more points than LeBron.

But LeBron vows that Game 2 on Thursday night (7 pm Eastern, ESPN) will be a lot different. Maybe for him, but Paul Pierce sees much more of the same from both teams for the duration of this series, however long it may go:

“You’re going to have to run through a brick wall to get to 100 points it seems like, the way these two teams play defense. You just expect it to be a defensive struggle throughout…Offensively, we were a terrible-looking group. We turned the ball over 23 times, shot 40 percent from the field. We did just about everything wrong you could do offensively, and what happens, the defense comes and saves the day.”

And it certainly did for Boston.

The Cavs were held to a dismal 30.7 percent shooting from the field and were beat, 43-41, on the boards in Tuesday’s 76-72 loss. But outside of LeBron’s horrible night from the floor, the Cavs have an elite defense of their own, and it stepped up big in Game 1 despite the losing effort.

Ray Allen was held scoreless. Paul Pierce scored only four points. As is the case with LeBron, you can’t expect those guys to get locked like that for the entire series. But the Cavs would be better off making those two beat them than letting Kevin Garnett have his way inside like he did for most of the night on Tuesday.

Ah, but the Cavs can control Garnett far more than you think. But that’s going to involve a trade-off - one that I’m not sure many Cavs fans want to see. “The SportingNews’” Stan McNeal elaborates:

“Wallace played exceptional defense when matched against Kevin Garnett in Game 1. Garnett was unable to get off a turnaround jumper without Wallace’s hand in his face, and Garnett also had trouble driving around the Cavs’ big man. Smith was defending when Garnett easily got to the rim for the Game 1 winner. Smith was inserted for offense, but the Cavs missed a late scoring opportunity and the Celtics took advantage by posting Garnett and not calling timeout. Without Wallace on the bench, Garnett had little resistance getting to the rim against Smith.

“On the flip side, when Wallace was in the game, Garnett was able to roam like an extra defender on LeBron because of the Celtics’ disrespect for Wallace’s offense. So do the Cavaliers go more with Smith and his jumper or Wallace and his defensive footwork? You’ll know they’ve decided on Wallace if the score doesn’t surpass the low 80s.”

We’ve already established that this entire series is going to be a defensive struggle. But putting in Wallace may not mean literally making LeBron beat the Celtics by himself.

Outside shooting was going to be key for the Cavs in this series from the start. Garnett is tough on his own in the low post, so trying to use Ilgauskas and even a guy like Joe Smith to beat the C’s inside probably isn’t going to work.

One of the reasons Cavs GM Danny Ferry said it’s important to surround a guy like LeBron with shooters is that lethal perimeter shooting is the best way to punish double teams. It’s how Daniel Gibson became a household name last May. And it’s why a guy like Wally Szczerbiak was brought in at the trade deadline this year.

And also expect to see a lot more of Sasha Pavlovic.

Yes, that face on the side of your milk carton is familiar. Those big shooting nights, athletic plays to the basket, and 20-plus scoring nights seem like they were only yesterday. That highlight-film block on Jason Kidd in Game 1 of last year’s second round doesn’t seem like a year ago, does it?

Sasha had close to a breakout year last season when he was inserted as the team’s starting shooting guard. I was expecting a Kevin Martin-type breakout season from ‘06-07 for Pavlovic this year. Instead, that contract holdout in the offseason combined with a sprained left ankle injury made this season nothing short of a nightmare for the 24-year old Serbian.

But in spot duty for Szczerbiak in Game 1, we saw flashes of the Sasha we missed dearly. He was able to get to the basket, put the ball on the floor, and provide the kind of athleticism and versatility that Szczerbiak cannot. Mike Brown has already said that it’s been difficult to find a way to work Pavlovic back into the lineup after he missed so much time, but expect that to become a little easier after Sasha’s showing on Tuesday.

Pavlovic is another one of those primary shooters Ferry and Brown want to use around LeBron for the long term. If that comes back in time for Game 2, it will be a heck of an added bonus for the Cavaliers in this series.

There are no guarantees in this series. For all we know, LeBron might be even worse in Game 2 than he was in Game 1. Allen and Pierce may both go scoreless. And as stellar the Cavs defense was on Tuesday night, slowing down Garnett in Game 2 and beyond will be a bigger step in getting back to the Eastern Conference Finals.

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 8th, 2008 at 12:26 pm and is filed under Joe Smith, Ben Wallace, Jason Kidd, Danny Ferry, Wally Szczerbiak, Sasha Pavlovic, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Cleveland Cavaliers, LeBron James, Mike Brown, Daniel Gibson, Boston Celtics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.