“Let’s start really narrowing in and focusing in on what’s going to help us in the playoffs.”
The Cleveland Cavaliers are still three months away from the playoffs, but they’ve already begun preparing for it. As successful as this season has been, they will ultimately be judged by how they perform in the postseason.
As a result, they’re beginning to emphasize things that will translate to success this spring.
“We’ve been kind of narrowing our focus right now, and like playoff focus, so we got certain KPIs (key performance indicators) that we want to hit in terms of our defense and our offense,” said head coach Kenny Atkinson before Monday’s win. “Let’s start really narrowing in and focusing in on what’s going to help us in the playoffs. And I do think that that changes from our beginning of the season [approach].”
What works in the regular season doesn’t always carry over to the postseason. The skill of your opponent combined with the significantly increased attention to detail makes it difficult to get by without some level of adjustments.
You don’t want to change entirely what worked in the regular season, but there is a need to emphasize different things heading into the playoffs.
“I would say 70% of it is the same basic things we’ve been doing, probably 30% where we’ve shifted our focus to different areas, possession game, being one of them,” Atkinson said when asked what areas of focus are different.
“Day one I wasn’t like, ‘Man, we’re gonna win the possession game.’ Now, as we start playing these more elite teams and start getting to the playoffs and where the plane feels a little more even. Possessions become more and more important because your margin is smaller. So that’s just one example of how we’ve shifted our mindset … Let’s win the turnover battle. Let’s win the rebounding battle.”
The Cavs have done a good job of protecting the ball and forcing turnovers. They rank third in turnover percentage on offense and 11th on defense.
Rebounding is another issue. They rank in the bottom ten in both offensive and defensive rebounding percentages. The defensive rebounding in particular is something you’d like to see change before the playoffs.
Their offensive proficiency in the regular season has helped paper over some of these flaws.
“The reason why we’ve overcome it is because we’ve shot the ball so darn good,” Atkinson said. “[We] shoot the heck out of the ball. But… It’s not always going to be the case.”
The defense hasn’t been as crisp as they would like it to be. Their goal is to be a top-five defense by the end of the regular season. But, how they get to that goal is more important.
Atkinson hasn’t been afraid to mix things up defensively throughout the season. The Cavs have run 2-3 zones and have experimented with blitzing out of both man and zone defenses while increasing the amount they’re switching screens.
This is a departure from J.B. Bickerstaff’s philosophy where the Cavs were content making only small tweaks to their base defense in the regular season and postseason.
Atkinson’s amount of defensive tinkering also stands in stark contrast with some of the other contending Cavs teams we’ve seen over the decade that were saving their best counter for the playoffs. This team has been showing it on the court throughout the year.
This isn’t by accident. Atkinson believes that repetition is the only way that they’ll get better.
“I think with this team, they were kind of a basic coverage team last year,” Atkinson said. “I just feel like you got to practice it live [in] live play. I think you got to bring it out in the regular season whether teams see it or not.”
Part of their defensive adjustments for the postseason is getting Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen more vocal in their defensive coverages.
“It’s not one of their strengths,” Atkinson said. “As part of our playoff focus, where we need to get to the next level, that was one of the bullet points on our PowerPoint to the guys. Communication is a big one. And we’re just okay. Those guys need to get better.”
The Cavs have exceeded expectations coming into the season. However, it’s still fair to question how much of this will work in later rounds of the playoffs given their recent results against the Oklahoma City Thunder and Boston Celtics.
All Atkinson can do presently is try and prepare his team the best he can. That starts now.
“Working with championship coaches, I love the Ty Lue [line],” Atkinson said. “He said, you work on a playoff adjustment a day. You know, you’re always working on something because you never know when you’re going to need it. But I really believe you do it in live play and not just in practice.”