Three Things to Watch For: Golden State vs. Cleveland Game 6
For the second time in a week, the NBA might be down to the final game of its 2015-16 season.
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The Cleveland Cavaliers extended its run on Monday evening by pulling out a desperate 112-97 win in Game 5, behind a pair of brilliant showcase games from LeBron James and Kyrie Irving. Working without suspended All-Star Draymond Green, the Warriors defense turned in a stinker, while the offense failed to replicate the white hot efficiency it came through with in what felt like a pivotal Game 4 win in Cleveland.
As reward, not only do the Cavaliers get to live to play another day on Thursday, but the team will get a chance to work one more time in northern Ohio during Game 6. We decided to ruminate on three different things that could stand out, regardless of the game’s outcome, during what could be a championship-clinching game.
Draymond Overextension
By now even the lightest of NBA fans is familiar with the Draymond Experience, how he plays on the proverbial razor’s edge and how that blade is just one of the many tools in the man’s Swiss Army Knife-styled game. Green’s presence in ensuring a Game 5 Finals win for the Warriors was no sure thing, not with his teammates missing as many open shots as they did, and not with LeBron James and Kyrie Irving making as many stunners as they did, but it certainly would have helped.
Alas, Green lashed out in Game 4, and was lost for what could have been a championship-clinching evening. Back to Cleveland with the lot of ya.
Prior to Monday evening, Green had sat just once in Golden State’s previous 103 games, a blowout loss in Denver back on Jan. 12, and in his first game back against the Lakers two nights later Draymond responded with one of his poorer games of the season – a 2-7 shooting night with four turnovers.
The reality that shook closest to his Game 5 absence took place against Oklahoma City in Game 4 of the Western Conference finals: Green narrowly missed suspension by the hair of Steven Adams’ chinny-chin-chin after kneeing the Thunder center in the groin during Game 3, and Golden State may have preferred their All-Star’s exclusion in the end. Draymond missed six of seven shots and turned the ball over six times in Game 4 loss, effectively suspending himself.
Draymond Green tends to press. He is one of the league’s more talented players and intriguing personalities, but it’s also important to remember that he’s just 26 months removed from emerging as a surprise starter in GSW’s 2014 first round loss to the Clippers. As was the case during Dennis Rodman’s sometimes fitful move from bench sparkplug to relied-upon star, there will be nights where Green’s frenzy wearies him.
In Game 6, and possibly beyond, Draymond has to find that balance. He has to take chances offensively and keep both his mouth and feet moving on the other end. Again, Green wasn’t going to check LeBron James or Kyrie Irving defensively for long stretches in Game 5, but the Cavaliers didn’t pull that game’s offensive rating out of thin air. And, as we saw repeatedly during Game 4, it’s never about individual defense with Draymond – it’s about how he slides over once you slide past your initial defender.
The key here is mental exhaustion. Even after working over 200 games in two years, we’re not worried about Draymond’s legs, and the (too?) long layoff between Friday’s Game 4 and Thursday’s Game 6 will help. No, the issue is Green replaying things in his head until he’s mentally spent by halftime, as appeared to be the case during his weary turn during those two fateful Golden State losses in Oklahoma City last month. It’s a very real possibility, and LeBron James (a June veteran working in his 198th career playoff game) will be able to spot someone teetering on the edge from a mile away.
All season long, despite the presence of an NBA MVP and an NBA Finals MVP, the Warriors have looked to Draymond Green to lead. To act as their Mike Singletary-type defensively (the Chicago version, Bay Area fans; I know you weren’t too keen on the San Francisco version) and its unyielding wave offensively. He’s the one that takes all the tough assignments on the floor, and answers the questions nobody else wants to touch off of it.
Even with Green back on the court in Game 6, those same silent teammates will have to do something with what Draymond has taught them. Because not even Draymond Green knows how he’ll be able to react, in his first game back.
Small Stuff
The extent of Andrew Bogut’s left leg injury is not yet known, despite a hurried rush to give him an MRI following his collapse on Monday evening. He could have suffered a career-altering ligament tear, a season-ending high ankle sprain, and even the best of news (say, a knee sprain along the same lines as Stephen Curry’s from late April) will keep him sidelined for the rest of this series even if the Cavaliers take it all the way toward Sunday’s Game 7.
Golden State has played without Bogut starting before, famously during Games 4 through 6 of last year’s NBA Finals (all wins), but also frequently during the regular season as Bogut banged his way through various ailments. Though his playing time seems perpetually held on a short leash by coach Steve Kerr, reserve center Festus Ezili remains one of the NBA’s best at his backup position, and when pushed ahead one spot he still qualifies as high caliber: Festus started 13 games for the Warriors during the regular season.
Small forward Brandon Rush, though, started twice as many contests; and not just when Harrison Barnes was injured. Kerr went to a super small lineup with Barnes, Draymond Green and Rush in the front court several times during the regular season, and if he prefers keeping Andre Iguodala’s rhythm in place off of the Golden State bench you might see Rush take the call once again in Game 6.
That might be good news for Dre, who too often saw his talents wasted on guarding the rather ghostly Kevin Love in the Game 5 loss.
How well it would work for Rush would be another story. The swingman has played just 102 minutes during Golden State’s 22-game playoff journey thus far, mostly in garbage time worked up toward the end of this postseason’s many, many blowouts. He was given spot duty during a close contest in Game 5, missing his lone shot while grabbing a steal and a block in under five minutes.
If Kerr goes to the super small lineup as a wrinkle, basically daring Kevin Love (whom Rush would probably be matched up against to end post possessions) to beat the Warriors to start the first and third quarters, the gambit could work. It would save Iguodala’s legs (Andre is averaging 34 minutes in these Finals, despite all the blowouts and despite starting just once) and while also preserving his role as the chief LeBron deterrent and extra pass maven off the bench.
Starting Ezili would result in the same for Iguodala, as Festus would then be charged with trying to get in the way of the seemingly perpetual series of five-offensive rebound first halves Cavaliers center Tristan Thompson keeps contributing.
Whatever the decision comes down to, the worst-case scenario is obvious: Golden State cannot afford lost minutes up front from players working in big positions. Whether it’s Ezili giving possessions back with missed free throws and/or turnovers, Green turning in a stinker, Bogut’s poor play on the road from earlier in the series and these playoffs, or Harrison Barnes’ often miserable turns when asked to move up a position, the Warriors cannot waste any more minutes.
Home Helpers
LeBron James may not tee off from the perimeter all over again, as he did during spots during Monday’s spectacular Game 5 performance, but he’ll show up in Game 6. The post-2012 version of LeBron always plays superior basketball during potential close out games, he’ll be working from home, and he was gifted with two full days off between games. This will be just his 20th NBA game since April 11, a veritable vacation in relative terms for LBJ.
What’s less certain is the potential production from his teammates.
Even for those living a transient lifestyle – J.R. Smith, post-trade, last season; Channing Frye, post-trade, this season – the home setting tends to work wonders for role players. The problem is that Cleveland’s role players have been ruddy awful during the Finals, with Smith’s inconsistent play acting as the lone bright spot, and with Kevin Love (and the lacking schemes designed to bring Kevin Love to life) turning himself into a role player. Richard Jefferson has been good, but the Cavaliers cannot win an NBA title, let alone Game 6, with Richard Jefferson merely being good for his age. The surprise ain’t enough.
Cavs guard Mendoza Matthew Dellavedova has looked passive offensively throughout this turn, and he needs to start firing the sorts of shots that frustrate a well-meaning defense, looks that open banging lanes up for offensive rebounders like Tristan Thompson. Smith followed up 7-13, 20-point turn at home in Game 3 with a 3-10, 10-point stinker at home in Game 4. He has to play crazyball, because he doesn’t really offer much outside of saving broken plays at this point.
Someone has to set a decided second screen for Channing Frye, even if he’s only out there for spot minutes to finish a quarter or half. Kevin Love has to pretend that he’s playing against the Atlanta Hawks. Cavaliers coach Tyronn Lue must figure out how to make Iman Shumpert a threat when he’s off the ball.
Illegal screens have to be set. Game 6’s referee crew will call the first pair they see so as to set the terms of engagement, but referees have a way of forgetting those terms when teams push back and continue to test the limits in that realm. Warriors both big and small can flop all they want on fouls either real or imagined, but the referees are not going to give LeBron James or even Tristan Thompson a third foul in the second quarter that sends them to the bench. Not in Game 6.
It’s not so much desperation, as it is daring. And, in J.R. Smith and Kyrie Irving’s case, derring-do. The Cavaliers are going to have to take some chances, because relying on another pair of 40-plus games from LeBron and Kyrie just ain’t the way to make it to the weekend.
It’s only your season on the line, guys.
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Kelly Dwyer is an editor for Ball Don’t Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @KDonhoops
