Donovan Mitchell & Cavaliers BLOW OUT Bucks, Cleveland surging | Hoops Tonight

Donovan Mitchell & Cavaliers BLOW OUT Bucks, Cleveland surging | Hoops Tonight

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So you guys don’t miss any of our content over the course of this season all right let’s talk some basketball obviously Giannis was out but the Cavs blitzed the bucks from the opening tip they were up 22-2 and I want to focus in on the defensive end of the floor because they

Here’s the thing even without Giannis and obviously Giannis is an incredibly important player for the bucks he’s the one fast guy really in that starting lineup like truly truly like transcendently Fast type of player right and so he’s going to it’s obviously going to hurt for him to not be out

There but there’s enough offensive skill in that lineup for them to be decent right especially on the offensive end of the floor like Dame is a transcendently great offensive player Chris Middleton is a good very very good offensive player Brook Lopez is a is a big man who brings enough offensive versatility to

To make scoring a possibility Malik Beasley’s been one of the best Shooters in the League this year Andre Jackson Jr was the one kind of like offensive weak point in that lineup but they literally could not generate a quality shot to save their lives to start this game and

So it came down to a bunch of of of specific matchup Dynamics so first of all Isaac aoro is on Damen Lillard and he’s one of the few players in the league that’s big enough or I should say bigger than Dame but also quick enough

To stay in front of him and what they were doing is in any Brook Lope action they were hedging and recovering with Jared Allen and Isaac kakuro would Sprint and meet Dame at some point on his drives as Dame would try to beat the Hedge with either a split or by

Dribbling around uh um by dribbling around Jared Allen and Isaac cor forced a couple of turnovers that way there was a time where Dame just straight up tried to ISO Isaac aoro early in the game and he just chested him up put his body in the way and Dame and Chris Middleton in

Particular were playing a lot of grift basketball they were kind of just dribbling into guy’s chest and throwing junk up and trying to get fouls we’ll talk about the bucks later but they they didn’t really attack this game um in any sort of serious manner a lot of stuff

Coming out of Milwaukee despite their record that’s kind of weird and and last night was definitely one of those games but Isaac aor on Dame was the first major matchup the second matchup and I thought the one that was arguably the most impactful during this run was Dean

Wade on Chris Middleton first of all same thing when Chris Middleton was attacking Dean Wade in isolation situations Dean Wade was playing classic positional defense he was sliding his feet taking the contact in the chest keeping his arms up high so that he doesn’t get called for a foul and he’s

Got good size and so he’s forcing Chris to take tough shots over the top and he was frustrating Chris as he was beating him to spots and Chris was just trying to throw junk up at The Rim to try to get fouls but the big thing that Dean

Wade was doing was his ability to switch they were switching the Dame Middleton pick and roll and putting Dean Wade on Dame Dean Wade got a stop sliding his feet on Dame they were switching any sort of uh uh pick and roll with gr uh with Brook Lopez and Chris Middleton so

Then Dean Wade would just rotate onto Brook Lopez and just kind of battle and they were doubling him out of that there was a possession to Donovan Mitchell’s credit who’s having a great defensive season he uh Dean Wade got Lopez on a switch Lopez backed him down on that

Left block and Donovan Mitchell sprinted in double teamed got him to get rid of the basketball pass went right it was only one pass away easy kick out to Malik Beasley Donovan Mitchell is an elite athlete at the guard position sprinted out like crazy and chased Malik

Beasley off the line and forced him into a dribble pullup jump shot but that ability of Dean Wade to not be super easily scored on in a switch against a big or a guard was a really useful uh tool for the Cavs during that defensive effort that really frustrated the

Milwaukee Bucks last night and then they just were pushing in transition on every single stop and milwa transition defense is awful they let teams get out and transition over 17% of their possessions which ranks dead last in the league according to cleaning the glass but that’s a good game plan from Cleveland

They were just running it down their throat every single time a lot of bad floor balance from Milwaukee there was a possession where at one point they had all five offensive players below the charge Circle and big shock it ended up leading to I believe if I remember

Correctly it was Max stru getting a run out a foul but that was all it was it was just incredible defense from all Five Guys completely bought in frustrating the Bucks and then sprinting it down the other end in transition and then a mix in of some Donovan Mitchell

Shot making he hit this ridiculous step back on Isaac aoro Where damn near made him fall down um or not on Isaac aoro excuse me it was on Andre Jackson Jr I don’t know I’m mixing names up today but uh it was a step back on Andre Jackson

Jr made him nearly fall down that he knocked down he had to pull up three in pick and roll over the screen he beat Malik Beasley in the mid-range with a pull-up jump shot it was just that that bit of shot makinging mixed in with running out for wide open layups and

Dunks and then excellent defense all of a sudden they’re up 2020 22 to2 and the Bucs quit and the game is over on the Bucs front like again I it kind of it it it just was it felt like one of those games where they realized Giannis was

Out and they went into the game with no real belief that they were going to win and you could see it in a bunch of different areas Dame and and Chris Middleton just dropping their shoulders into Defender chest and then just trying to draw fouls by just throwing up weird

Shots like Dame was drawing multiple Defenders at the ball screen but just swinging the ball out of it not really doing anything to try to compromise the defense in that situation and then they were jogging back in transition a lot of basic things too like floor balance

Stuff where guys are you know it just it just was incredibly sloppy uh a basketball from the Milwaukee Bucks again it’s one of those ones that you just kind of crumple up and throw out but again like Milwaukee’s got a really good record but there’s just some weirdness surrounding that team I’m not

I’m not sure what it is but at the same time I want to cut them the same slack that I’ve been cutting a lot of teams which is this is the NBA in January this is what it can be like sometimes you’re right smack in the middle of things so

You’ve been doing this for a long time and you still have a really long way to go and I think that that can go a long way towards just kind of like causing wildly oscillating levels of effort from Team night to night right you get a Boston team that beats the Timberwolves

And then gets their ass kicked by the Bucks the Bucks kick the out of the Celtics and then go get their ass kicked by the Cavs right like it’s just this weird dynamic where it’s the oscillating effort that’s primarily dictating whether or not a team you know kind of

Comes out with the uh uh with a win on any given night in this time of year so I want to cut the buck some slack you just kind of crumple that one and throw away but it definitely was a disappointing effort now on the Cavs front Evan Mobley went down after the

Orlando game 18 games ago then they quickly drop three of their next four and then Darius Garland goes out of the lineup and then everybody in the League’s like hm this is interesting like we’re not sure even if the Allen Mobly front Court Works in terms of the

Playoffs it’s just really difficult for them to score and pick and roll in that situation you have two small guards in that lineup now you have Darius Garland and Evan Mobley out for a long time the regular season to that point hadn’t been that impressive from Cleveland and so

You’re like hm like this kind of felt like a teetering Point like it was a teetering point where it might be one of those things where Now’s the Time to kind of reconfigure or or are they going to kind of Salvage these things nope they salvaged things they went 11 and3

Over their next 14 games since Dar darus scarland went out sixth in offense and third in defense most of their success comes off of similar stretches to what we saw last night against Milwaukee they defend like crazy and they get out and run as a matter of fact they’re only

24th in the NBA in halfcourt offense so they’re not really great at scoring as a matter of fact they’re bad at scoring in the slow down half court environment but they’re seventh in fact fast break points per 100 possessions this season they get out and run and that bolsters

Them on the offensive end of the floor but most importantly they don’t just run for the sake of running there are a lot of teams that run out in transition and take bad shots the Cavs do not do that they run selectively when they see good opportunities for them to get great

Shots they run off their defense in particular they’re not just just playing with unnecessary Pace right they’re at 1.17 points per transition possession that ranks eighth in terms of a efficiency per possession among all NBA teams that’s excellent overall cleaning the glass has this metric it’s a cool

Metric they call it um transition points added per 100 possessions it’s just a way to kind of like singularly capture your volume of transition and your efficiency into like one metric right because there are a lot of teams that run in transition a ton but they don’t necessarily score and then there are

Selective teams that run a lot or don’t run as often but when they do they get layups and dunks right and those are the teams that are more efficient right and then there’s a a metric that cleaning the glass has that kind of combines all of that stuff well for the Cavs they

Rank third in the league in that kind of combined metric meaning they are the third best transition offense in the NBA so the question is why is Cleveland’s defense so successful and the reality is really simple it’s complete in total buyin down the lineup from everyone including their star Donovan Mitchell is

Flying around and helping recover situations Dean Wade we talked about earlier is competing in switches against players bigger and smaller than him and he’s guarding Wings well Isaac aoro and Max Tru are competing at the point of attack with physicality and Relentless back pressure and and and and just using

Their quickness and size right aoro specifically is one of those guys he has his offensive limitations but he’s just he’s just such a useful defensive player with his ability to guard the quick guards in the league with his size that can that can become a problem right and

Then Jared Allen he’s capable of switching he’s cap capable of dropping he’s capable of hedging he’s just a versatile defensive big he kind of fits into that mold that I talk about in terms of Team construct where you want to have a defensive kind of fulcrum at

The center position that can defend in multiple coverages otherwise you become very matchup dependent right the defense is real too regardless of opponent as a matter of fact they allow just 112 Points 11 12.4 points per 100 possessions against the top 10 offenses in the league which ranks number one in

The NBA now to be clear they’ve been in an easier stretch of their schedule as of late and things will get tougher but they’re playing some really good basketball they’re now going on the road to play four tough games they’re at Atlanta at Orlando at Milwaukee twice

Then they come home for the Clippers and so we’re going to find out really quickly how much of this is real for them at least in terms of this particular group obviously with Garland and Moy still being or Garland and Moy still being out specifically it’s going

To come down to a couple uh to it’s going to come down to can they get enough stops to get out and transition often enough to bolster their half court offense and then in the half court are they’re going to get enough shot making from guys like Donovan Mitchell right

Like that that’s going to be what’s going to carry them against these better opponents because what’s going to happen is specifically teams like Orlando has really big perimeter offensive players are going to try to attack the smaller Cleveland perimeter Defenders right um the Clippers are going to space

Them out and and test some of their other perimeter defensive players and if they don’t get as many stops they’re not going to be able to run as much which is going to put a strain on their halfcourt offense and they’re at Milwaukee twice and Milwaukee’s going to want revenge so

Those are going to be some tough games if they can go three and five or three- two in those five games that would be a huge win for this Cleveland Cavaliers Team

Jason Timpf reacts to Donovan Mitchell and the Cleveland Cavaliers 135-95 blowout win over Damian Lillard and the Milwaukee Bucks. Jason reacts to the Cavs coming on strong as of late, and how their elite defense has carried them in the Eastern Conference.

Timeline:
00:00 – Bucks blown out vs. Cavs
06:49 – Cavs surging
09:13 – How has Cavaliers defense been so successful?

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