Why Cavs can defy odds and still beat Knicks despite 22-point Game 1 meltdown

The Cleveland Cavaliers blew it. Up 22 points in Game 1 of the NBA Eastern Conference Finals on the New York Knicks with 7:52 left in regulation, they thought they could run QB kneel and walk to the finish line rather than running through to cross the tape. Instead of holding a one-game lead, the Cavs have to live with a short memory not only before Thursday, but for the rest of the series. Donovan Mitchell, James Harden, and the team are adamant that nobody will flinch.

“I said it in the locker room, ‘We lost. We f***ing blew it. Alright. Respond for Game 2,'” Mitchell stated following the 115-104 overtime defeat at Madison Square Garden. “We didn’t close it out. We’ve got to clean it up and go from there.

“It’s one loss. It’s a bad loss, but all we can do is go back, watch the film, and fix it. We could’ve lost by 40. It still would’ve been 1-0. We played pretty solid for three quarters or so. We’ll make adjustments and go from there.”

It’s a hard pill to swallow, and that’s putting it generously. We can talk about Cleveland’s lack of execution down the stretch, Jalen Brunson’s star-studded takeover in New York’s most desperate moments, or Cavs head coach Kenny Atkinson pocketing his timeouts as the Knicks chipped away and just kept playing.

Harden can get the fifth degree for his shortcomings defending on an island, and the team’s tactical strategy can be roasted for allowing switches on Brunson to happen so easily. Jarrett Allen missed free throws, and Evan Mobley clanked some shots. Mitchell can be questioned for his role in the stagnancy and lack of trust in his teammates in crunch time, yet again. All of that is fair game.

For most squads, this kind of loss would have devastating, long-term effects. Luckily for the Cavs, they’ve already experienced the bumpiest roads (mostly on their own volition) and seen it all to get to this point — not once, not twice, but multiple times in different scenarios.

“It’s no different than playing a solid [Game 6] in Toronto, and RJ Barrett hits the shot that goes all the way to the top,” Mitchell said. “It’s the same. It’s one loss. They’re bad. We’ve had some tough ones. But it’s one loss. It’s not like that loss gives them two or three games, right? It’s one. So, we have an opportunity to come back here in two days and steal one here, and that’s really all it is. If you allow yourself to go down that path, you won’t be ready for Game 2.”

“We lost the first two games last series, so we’ve been here before,” Evan Mobley said. “You’ve just got to bounce back. You’ve got to look at the film, see what we can change, and fix that… I think we played pretty good basketball throughout most of the game. It’s just, that fourth, we’ve got to keep playing that way. But we know we did a pretty good job for most of the game, so that’s a positive, and we’ve just got to continue that into the next game and just finish the whole game that way.”

Harden, who was the culprit of late-initiated fourth-quarter possessions and the target of Brunson defensively, echoed the same message as his teammates.

“We’re a super confident team,” Harden said. “Obviously, we understand we literally let one slip away, but we got a lot of positives out of this game. So, just watch film, figure out what we can correct, and put an entire game together.

“It’s a part of it. Obviously, you don’t want this one. This is a tough one. But we’ve had opportunities to even close teams out at home, and we didn’t do it. So, we’re literally figuring everything out on the fly, which is a good thing. Tonight was one of the feelings where it was a bad thing, but we’ve been really good at responding and coming back and bouncing back, so it’s no different.”

To the Cavs, this is just another one to add to the list, another mountain to climb this postseason.

We’ve asked, “How do they overcome this one?” more than a handful of times in the last month. To Mitchell’s point, aside from the postgame rage room on social media and in local Northeast Ohio area households, what makes this any different?

“We had some bad games the first couple of series,” Dean Wade said. “We persevered, fought, and came back and played good basketball at the end, so we’re not too down. It stings being up that much and not coming out with a win, but we know the kind of team we are and what we can be. We’ve just got to keep pushing.”

And here the Cavs are, again, this time vs. the Knicks

Tuesday was a microcosm of the Cavs’ playoff run to this point. For most of the first 36 minutes, they looked like the Game-7-in-Detroit version of themselves. The rock was moving, communication was on point, and everybody was making a play for the man next to him, whether the shots were falling or not. The Knicks were second- and third-guessing themselves offensively, as double-big lineups made them hesitant on their next moves.

However, when a massive lead was built, Cleveland went into frontrunner mode, lacking trust and falling into old habits, a frustrating tendency that the group has still not gotten past when it’s winning time.

“My only regret, and this can happen when you get a little fatigued, I think it just stopped moving,” Atkinson said. “We were pinging the ball all over the place, great ball movement, and then, it just got a little stagnant. I told the guys we played great basketball the majority of the game. The ball stuck at the end a little bit there.

“You’ve got to keep trusting the pass. But I’ll also say we got a ton of great looks that didn’t go in, so we’ll look at it. I think decisions [have] got to be better, especially when we get fatigued. Sometimes, we tend to want to put our heads down too much. Just got to find the open guy.”

Harden agrees with that sentiment and emphasized that Cleveland has been in situations like these all playoffs.

“It’s night and day when our pace is fast, we’re moving, we understand what we’re doing,” Harden said. “Our quality of shots is much better, and then, we’re able to get our defense set back. When we play with our pace offensively, we literally can get any shot we want to.

“And defensively, when we’re on a string, we [have to] limit them to one shot. They got a couple of offensive rebounds, especially in that fourth quarter, which gave them extra possessions.”

Atkinson characterized Game 1 as a “tough one.”

“I thought they hit some really tough shots in that fourth quarter,” Atkinson said. Those two threes, prayer threes, end of shot clock. We got a little unlucky, quite honestly. Brunson obviously took over at the end, and we started double-teaming him and tried to do some different things. But, listen, I said I’m super proud of the way our group played. We played great basketball tonight for three quarters. Unfortunately, they dominated us in the fourth quarter.

“We held him at check most of the game, right? It was basically the fourth quarter. He got loose, and we definitely tried to mix up some stuff, throw some stuff at him. We’ll have to keep looking at it. He hit a lot of his tough floaters and hit that tough contested three. I felt like they hit a lot of tough shots. I mean, the two [Mikal] Bridges threes, like, what are you going to do?”

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