Recap: Hawks 98, Cavs 96 (or, But First… Let Me Take A Selfie)

Who says the pre-season can’t be fun? Despite being a few men down, including two of the three cornerstones of the franchise, the Cavs managed to have a good time and thoroughly entertain their extended Ohio fanbase in Cincinnati during their pre-season opener against the Atlanta Hawks. The King and his men treated a capacity crowd of Queen City inhabitants (all wearing their free yellow “We Are Cavaliers” t-shirts) to a night of crisp passes, aerial displays, thunderous dunks, surprise sideline visits and the above selfie moment during a timeout to memorialize it all.

Unfortunately, the Hawks must not have received the good times memo, as they seemed to treat this exhibition more like the Game 5 they never got against the Cavs in last year’s Eastern Conference Finals, often ratcheting up the intensity. There were also a few testy moments, especially between Kent Bazemore and LeBron, who jawed at each other throughout the contest. Maybe it was a continuation of their verbal duel in the playoffs, or maybe it had something to do with Bazemore undercutting an airborne LBJ, sending him crashing headfirst into the first row. J.R. Smith also got into the act, swatting Al Horford in the head, and earning a Flagrant 1 technical.

Yet, even though the Cavs ultimately lost the game, to paraphrase LeBron, at least nobody got hurt… so it’s still a win.

LeBron James says moving forward when a reporter ask how did the game go, he said he's going to say "Nobody got injured, so we won."

— Chris Haynes (@ChrisBHaynes) October 8, 2015

Amongst the hype, hoopla and spectacle of the kickoff to the pre-season, there was some actual basketball played for much of the night. Although, David Blatt, in an effort to create some fabricated consistency, defaulted to an NHL style line change substitution pattern. Instead of phasing in one or two guys at a time, he kept the starters as one unit, then replaced them with a complete backup unit, and then finally worked in a few of the camp invitees toward the end of each half. This led to a bit of choppiness and created some scoring droughts since scorers were in shorter supply on the second line. But, since that’s the way Coach Blatt delineated and deployed his troops, that’s how I’ll recap their collective performances…

First Line

What will likely serve as the starting lineup when the games that matter begin on October 27 (with Kevin Love replacing James Jones if healthy and ready), played relatively well together. On offense, the ball movement to start the game was precise and plentiful, often with at least four (if not all five) Cavs on the floor touching the ball. Mo, J.R. and LeBron all found ways to either swing the ball to an open shooter or drive and drop off an inside pass to their thundering Russian big man. In fact, the first nine baskets the Cavs scored were all assisted (they wound up with 25 for the game).

James Jones reminded everyone why his middle name is “freaking” by canning three of his first five triples. He also played some fairly spry defense on the larger Paul Millsap. Though Jones went a little cold in the second half, the elder statesman of this team already looks ready for the season to start. J.R. also had himself a game, swishing six of his 10 shots from long and close range, and working in tandem with Mo to make the extra passes to get the best looks. Mo only hit one of his three shots, but ran the offense well in Kyrie’s stead. On the flip side, defense from the Cavs starting backcourt was often just a rumor against Atlanta speedsters Jeff Teague and Denis Schroder, who seemingly scored at will.

LeBron had an off shooting night (3-13), but to be fair, it really seemed like he was more concerned with getting the other guys clicking. He still stuffed the stat sheet with eight points, seven boards, five assists, three steals (and one selfie) in just 22 minutes of work. He fortunately wasn’t injured in his spill into the stands, and looked healthy and energetic throughout. And, in addition to his crowd selfie, he also invited one lucky young lady to join him on the sidelines for a visit.

Best thing @notthefakeSVP saw today: @KingJames invites young fan to sit next to him on bench during game.
No doubt. http://t.co/V0B3kRGFgV

— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) October 8, 2015

Probably the biggest standout of the First Line was Mozilla. After looking particularly rusty in Monday’s Wine & Gold Scrimmage, Moz busted out his stickum and rage, catching several nifty passes in traffic, and throwing down dunks with primal authority. Give him 13 points on 6-7 shooting, with five boards and a block. He also seemed to move much better on defense, holding the Hawks’ big men in check in the first half. He did have two goaltending calls (one of which would have been legal in Euroleague…).

Second Line

The backup line featured Delly at PG, Joe Harris at SG, Richard Jefferson at SF, Andy V at PF and Sasha Kaun at C. If you’re like me, you looked at this lineup and wondered aloud to yourself, “wait, who’s going to shoot the ball?” The immediate answer to this question was, unexpectedly, AV. Yes, after the complete line change substitution, with the clock running down, Andy drilled his slightly awkward 18 footer from just beyond the elbow, and I got a tremendous nostalgic remembrance of the AV of old. Even though this would be the only points the Second Line would score on their first go round (the Hawks went on a 9-0 run to end the quarter), it was still great to see Andy hitting shots, moving well and causing chaos. He scored eight points on 4-5 shooting with two rebounds, two assists and a ton of energy in his 15 minutes of play.

The backup backcourt fared less well against the Hawks’ D. Though Delly made several deft assists and pulled down five boards with a steal, he had a couple of rough turnovers and made only one of his six shots (though the one make was an authoritative tear drop drive). His running mate for much of the time, Joe Harris, proved that where there’s smoke… there’s not always fire. Smokin’ Joe’s shot looked mostly broken this night, and looked a step slow on defense. Joe could be in real danger of losing his spot to one of the athletic guys competing for spot #15.

Sasha didn’t quite have the impact he had during Monday’s scrimmage. He seemingly had his hands on the ball a lot, but either found himself well defended, or didn’t look for his shot as he wound up going scoreless. The other big Russian did pull down four rebounds, but he often looked lost defensively as the Atlanta guards got to the rack repeatedly. RJ, even though he’s no longer a prolific shooter, found himself forced to be the primary option on the Second Line. A few times, he had to jack up a shot with the clock running down, and as a result, went only 2-9 (1-4 from beyond the arc). However, RJ had arguably the play of the game when he turned back the clock and threw down a monster one-handed jam, posterizing the 7’2″ Walter Tavares, causing the Cavs’ bench to erupt with glee.

https://vine.co/v/e0uxgIOPpIX

Overall, the Second Line struggled to maintain what the First Line started, losing the lead in their first quarter stint, and falling behind by double digits in their second quarter duty. Although, their appearance in the third quarter was bolstered by a few members of the Third Line, and they turned things around on the Hawks.

Third Line

Quinn Cook and Jared Cunningham alternately got a shot with the Second Line in place of Joe Harris (Cook in the second quarter and Cunningham in the third). Cook had some heady assists, but also some costly turnovers, and wasn’t able to score like he did in Monday’s scrimmage. Cunningham, however, used his energetic play and fearless drives to the basket to help the Cavs claw their way back into the game at the end of the third quarter. He was the only Cav to get to the line more than twice, hitting a perfect 5-5, and also nailed a triple during the run. Though he had back-to-back turnovers in the quarter, he brought some much needed energy to the Cavs’ perimeter defense.

Joining Cook and Cunningham on the floor in the fourth quarter were Austin Daye and Chris Johnson. After missing his first two three-ball attempts, the sharpshooting Daye drilled his next four to help pull the Cavs to within a bucket or two. Give him 12 points in just 10 minutes of play. Daye’s stroke is tremendously smooth for a big man, and he resembled the kind of spot up shooter that could actually see some time on the floor in the regular season for this team. Even though it was against the Hawks own Third Line guys, Daye showed himself to be a real threat for the 15th or even 14th (sorry Joe) spot on the roster. He also looked solid on defense, making the most of his massive wingspan.

Austin Daye has hit four three pointers in a row without hitting the rim. 2015/2016 MVP lock.

— Jacoby (@djacoby) October 8, 2015

Chris Johnson got the nod as the last man in, leaving D.J. Stephens and Nick Minnerath to ride the pine. CJ was solid if unspectacular in his workmanlike eight minutes on the court – his lone highlight, a clever dropstep from the top of the key followed by a nice flush.

The Evil:

It’s the pre-season, and the first game of the pre-season at that. Sure, it will be nice to see the Cavs give a more sustained and concerted effort on the defensive side of the ball, but that comes with time and communication. There’s too many guys either out or still recovering from injuries to be concerned in the least about this. Blatt may want to switch things up a bit, however, to balance out the scoring options in his disparate lineups. Seems like either J.R. or Mo should come off the bench until Kyrie returns.

The Cavs shot a TON of threes. They also missed a TON of threes. In all, they went 14-37 (38%), and the number would have been worse if not for the Austin Daye barrage at the end. Conversely, they only got to the line half as often as the Hawks (15 attempts to Atlanta’s 30). Part of this was the officiating, but part of it was the Cavs’ penchant to fire long range bombs with abandon.

Kent Bazemore: this guy needs to remember it’s still the pre-season and take things down a few notches. Yes, you got swept by the Cavs. Yes, you’re trying to show you can replace DeMarre Carroll. Yes, you’re in a contract year. Still, none of these things warrants over-aggression and constant trash talk in a game that doesn’t count.

The Genius:

Basketball is back!

Andy can still move and shoot!

RJ can still dunk!

Nobody got hurt!

Oh… and, by the way, here’s how that selfie turned out…

The #LeBronSelfie pic.twitter.com/W0ivwUHwLQ

— Patrick Dillon (@pdillon24) October 8, 2015