3. Points Allowed Off Turnovers
If any game against the Pacers should have been a relative breeze, it should have been Game 2 at Quicken Loans Arena. The Cavs shot 55.3 percent from the floor and got a combined 89 points from their Big 3 of James, Irving and Love.
So how were the Pacers able to hang around? One large reason was that they forced the Cavs into 19 turnovers which they converted into 24 points. As ABC analyst and longtime NBA coach Hubie Brown mentioned at halftime of Game 4, the Cavs have been susceptible to points in transition. They were only a middle-of-the-pack team in fast-break points allowed during the regular season and finished 22nd in defensive efficiency, worse than every other playoff team except the Portland Trail Blazers.
An encouraging sign is that they gave up only seven points off 13 turnovers in Game 4.
“I thought defensively we took a step forward,” coach Tyronn Lue said. “Defensively I thought we took a step forward. And that’s all I wanted to see. I know we can score the basketball. Getting the stops is most important. All these games came down to the wire and when we needed to get stops, we got stops.”
Next: Kyrie’s Defensive Lapses
