Recap: Pacers 93, Cavs 86 (or, All Kinds of Stuck… and Stuckey)

The Cavs’ high octane offense ran into a mud patch against the Pacers.

Well… even though a Cavs loss was not the way I had hoped to start my first shot at a full recap, there was still a lot of heart to be found in the wine and gold squad last night. Though they were missing Kyrie (due to a shoulder strain) and LeBron (due to Coach Blatt’s decision to rest him), the rest of the team definitely came revved up to play.

Unfortunately, they got caught in the quagmire of the muddy pace of the Pacers for much of the game.

First Quarter: The Cavs started Delly and James Jones in place of Kyrie and LeBron (respectively) and, despite the best hopes for a “Rudy” type performance from Matt, the chances for a win seemed fairly slim. However, when that first Delly drive and toss somehow rolled around the rim and in, it seemed like maybe the magic might happen…

U-Dog probably summed the shot up best with: “. . . (Delly) with a rare Shaqtin’ a fool make. Ugly shot. Lives right – like Rudy did.”

The Cavs got off to a terrific start, surprising the Pacers with some great ball movement and tenacious D, and before you could say “dreams don’t come true,” Delly had a quick five points to put the Cavs up 10-2. Delly snagged a rebound and dished to JR Swish who hit his second three to force a quick Vogel timeout to regroup. Another Delly highlight with a sweet tear drop from down under pushed the advantage. KLove connected to get the lead to 12 with a three off of a JR drive and dish. Then it was JR’s turn with a deep three (as Phil Hubbard said “JR from Muncie!”) followed by a massive block on George Hill.

Both teams traded baskets and then went cold for nearly a three minute stretch until Mike Miller checked in to give Delly a blow and Iman took over the ball-handling duties. What happened next wasn’t all Shump’s fault (since he was passing the ball to Kendrick Perkins both times), but the next two possessions were almost mirror image turnovers where Shump drove and tried to drop the ball off to Perk in the lane, only to have it bounce off of his brick wall exterior, get stolen by the Pacers, and lead to back-to-back run out baskets. Shump, not wanting to take a third chance at a turnover, kept the ball and drained a nifty foul-line jumper off of one leg. Miller hit JR with a terrific in-bounds sneak-attack that caught Stuckey sleeping for a quick layup to finish the scoring. Cavs 28-19.

At the end of one, Delly had a line of seven points, four rebounds and three assists. The triple-double-Delly watch was on…

You want me to play how many minutes Coach?

Second Quarter:

Fred and AC joked that Stuckey got stuck in the mud at the end of the first quarter when JR caught him napping, but he would get free early and often in the second, while the Cavs offense would stagnate as the Pacers muddied up the pace of the game.

Stuckey started the scoring with a healthy three, followed with a driving layup using his “Stuckey shoulder” and assisted on a Rudez three, all while the Cavs were missing some easy shots at the rim (partly because the refs seemed to let the Pacers get away with as much rough play as they wanted). It took KLove taking a Scola flagrant-1 elbow to the face to finally get a bit of justice.

After Kev’s throws, Stuckey struck again, then George Hill abused the Cavs for an oop to Hibbert and a subsequent jumper off a point blank miss for Kevin. With the Cavs lead cut to one, Blatt wisely took a timeout. The breather seemed to give Delly a shot of adrenaline (he started the quarter 0-4) since he drove for an assisted layup to Moz and moments later had another (awkward but successful) drive to the hoop, although he took a whopping 14 shots in the first half… and made only four. Mozilla followed up an acrobatic layup off of a Delly assist missed shot, with a HUGE REJECTION of Hibbert right at the rim… As CLF said: “IRON CURTAIN SAYS NYET!!!”

Unfortunately, the Cavs would go ice cold as they were forced into even more of a plodding half court game. The Pacers took the lead on another Stuckey jumper (this one over a worn out Delly), and the Cavs wouldn’t score again until The Champ James Jones nailed a three from the top of the key. Not to be outdone, Stuckey dead-eyed a three (giving him 12 points in the quarter) to push the Pacer lead back to six at the half. Pacers 51-45.

Third Quarter: The third quarter was more of the same for the Cavs offense as Indy slowed the pace to a crawl at times and never really let the Cavs get out and run (not that they seemed all that inclined to do so). But the Cavs did manage to turn up the intensity level on defense. An early tough fall-away from JR and a terrific inside pass from Moz to KLove for an easy layup were off-set by a couple of David West jumpers and a push-off jumper from CJ Miles. It’s safe to say that the Cavs received the same homestyle treatment from the whistle-blowers in this game that the Warriors got in Cleveland last night (Cavs had 14 trips to the stripe compared with 29 for Indy). But the Pacers did play stifling D… as JB225 noted: “Have to give them credit they really play great defense. Cavs can’t get a score… Cavs can’t even get a drive to the basket.”

After a couple of free throws by KLove, the only Cav who would score for the remaining 8:30 of the quarter was Shump, as he did his best quasi-LBJ impression. Meanwhile, the Pacers kept building their lead off of trips to the foul line, Ian Mahinmi bunnies and transition three from old pal CJ Miles. Out of a timeout, Shump decided to go full-Kingsize and freight-trained it down the middle for a right hand Dunk of the Night! But despite his #Samson efforts… the Cavs found themselves behind by 13 going into the fourth. Pacers 74-61.

As JoeyB noted: “We are shooting less than 35%. Wow. Maybe Lebron and Kyrie are good.”

Fourth Quarter: The final quarter was a virtual yo-yo of runs between these two teams. The Cavs started off strong, and seemingly determined to claw their way back into the game with a 9-2 spurt, punctuated by a couple of nice KLove shots in the post and a left side three from The Champ. But then the Pacers ripped off nine straight of their own with a Stuckey breakaway, more free throws and yet another deep three from CJ. All seemed pretty much academic when West hit an uncontested layup to put the Pacers up by 15 with four and a half minutes to go.

But the Cavs had one more push in them and put together an 11-0 furious flurry capped off by a Delly trey and a beautiful pass from KLove to TT for a jam that cut the Pacer lead to four with 1:35 to go. Cavs looked like they might pull off the scrappy victory, but got one more dagger to the heart from supersub Stuckey. JR hit a gunslinger trey to get it close again, but the Cavs couldn’t control the rebound on a Pacer miss (mainly because KLove got donkey kicked by TT on a bad case of friendly fire). Delly pulled down an “Australian rules” kind of board and got to the foul line to cut it back to four. Then he nearly got into a scrum with West on the ensuing inbounds play. TT was there to back Rudy up which was awesome to see. A few free throws and a heady steal by Hill, and that was the ball game. Pacers 93-86.

The Evil:

No stopping Stuckey. It’s not just the Cavs who can’t stop Rodney Stuckey… he’s been going off on teams for a while now and is shooting at an unbelievable percentage. He really took over in the second quarter when the Pacers needed someone to score. Under normal circumstances, Delly probably has a bit more energy to help defend him coming off the bench… but tonight he scorched the Cavs and hit a dagger three in the end.

The ball seemed stuck too. While it was hard to fault the effort the Cavs gave, there didn’t always seem to be much of a game plan after the first quarter. The absence of LBJ and Kyrie seemed to provide the perfect opportunity for the Cavs to practice running sets and focus on ball movement. Much of the second and third quarters devolved into one-on-one match-ups and a lot of stagnation. The tough and physical defense of the Pacers certainly contributed to this, but it seems like there should have been more flow. The Cavs ultimately succumbed to the Pacers’ plodding style and pace. They also had ZERO fast-break points… which has to be a first for this season.

38 Minutes of Hell-ovadova. He played more minutes than anyone else on the floor (which was 18-20 more than he should under normal circumstances). And he took way too many shots…well, at least in the first half anyway… He shot 14 times (18 for the game), which shouldn’t happen, even with LBJ and Kyrie out. It would have been better for Matt to be looking to pass instead of shoot, although the Pacers did clog the passing lanes and cover everyone else… pretty much daring him to shoot. Delly played his guts out, but he’s got his limits and the offense negatively affected his defense. Cavs may need that extra PG after all…

Not enough Love. Kevin still got his 17 and 10, but it took him an inefficient 19 shots to get there. His outside shot was off. He did make a concerted effort to get down low to attack later in the game, but this should have been a game that he took over and had the offense run through him. That didn’t happen.

Moz was Missing. Only 18 minutes for the big Russian? What gives? It’s not like he was in foul trouble, and he seemed to have a big impact when he was in the game. This puzzled me.

Argentinian Russell Brand. Luis Scola is by far my least favorite player in the NBA. He’s constantly doing annoying things (like the flagrant-1 he hit KLove with), and he’s one of the worst over-actors in the game on fouls. Plus, he resembles another bad actor:

The Genius:

All the heart and effort. The Cavs came to play on a night where they could have just phoned it in. They were without their top two players and leaders, but they came out swinging. Even after they were down big in the third and fourth quarters, they still dug deep and found a way to get within four points in the final minutes. They were probably one stop away from having a real shot to win.

Shump takes over. Someone had to step up in the third to keep the Cavs within striking distance… and that someone was the man with the gigantic hair. He did his best LBJ impression and even threw down the aforementioned dunk of the night with authority. Even though his handle isn’t always the tightest, a performance like this bodes well.

JR does what it takes. Earl shot it well early to put the Cavs up, hit a big three late to keep them close and led all scorers with 21. In between, he continued to do all of the little things he’s been doing over the past several weeks to help the team win.

TT the enforcer. Towards the end of the game when Delly got too physical with West and West knocked him down, TT was the one getting right in his face. Never want to see guys come to blows, but it was awesome to see TT come to Delly’s defense. He’s got an edge to him on the court this year… and that’s a good thing.

Rudy tried his best. Delly did everything he could. He probably knew it wouldn’t be enough, but he gave it his all anyway. You can choose to dislike a guy who isn’t talented enough to get it done… but it’s hard to dislike a guy who tries as hard as Delly does. He didn’t ultimately get that triple-double (that honor went to George Hill), but he gave it his best shot.

Here’s hoping Kyrie and LBJ are back and healthy for the Rockets on Sunday…