After a confrontational close to the first round for both teams, the Cleveland Cavaliers and Chicago Bulls are primed for the Eastern Conference matchup that we all expected. The Bulls will hope to leave the Cavaliers seeing red with their physical grit-and-grind defense while Cleveland plans a stampeded of their own, centered on the two-pronged attack of Lebron James and Kyrie Irving.
There was a lot of hope that the Chicago Bulls and Cleveland Cavaliers would face each other in the playoffs, but everyone probably would have preferred this matchup to happen in the Conference Finals instead of the Semi-Finals.
The Bulls morphed into one of the most tenacious defensive units in the entire league after the arrival of head coach Tom Thibodeau, but this season they have been anything but impressive on that end of the floor. Not since the final season that Vinny Del Negro was in have the Bulls had a worse Defensive Rating, putting them over a full point of standard deviation below the league average. The Cavaliers kinda-sorta did a Clippers thing by getting three really good players and then trying to build the bric-a-brac pieces around them to make it work.
There are a few differences between the Clippers and Cavaliers that are important to point out. Chris Paul is a much better point guard than Kyrie Irving. While Irving can dazzle or occasionally just go out of his mind on the offensive end of the floor, he doesn’t bring the same team impact that Paul brings to the Clippers.
Kyrie Irving: 21.7 PPG, 5.2 AST, 1.5 STL, 86.3% FT, 46.8 FG%, 21.5 PER
Chris Paul: 19.1 PPG, 10.2 AST, 1.9 STL, 90.0% FT, 48.5 FG%, 26.0 PER
The Cavaliers are in year one of the Lebron Part 2 incarnation. The Clippers are a unit that has seen players emerge, think Griffin’s mid-range game and the protected area dominance of DeAndre Jordan. Those players didn’t show up this year to make a run at a title, they have been part of the organization for many years.
David Blatt is not Doc Rivers. Doc has been around the NBA for a very long time as player, then coach. He has already won an NBA title with Boston and now acts as both head coach and general manager in Los Angeles. Blatt is in his first gig at the helm and it has produced mixed results, though the additions of J.R. Smith, Iman Shumpert and Timofey Mozgov have definitely helped tilt the season into a much more favorable direction.
Given these differences, it is easy to say that the Cavaliers are not yet in their best form. This is a good thing for the Chicago Bulls. It would appear that the Thibodeau Era is nearing its close and they may never have a better chance to overtake the Cavaliers than right now.
Another reason to think the Bulls have a fighting chance against the Cavaliers is injuries. In past years, it might be Derrick Rose, Joakim Noah or Luol Deng that was in the hospital, playing on non-existent knees, or undergoing revivification – whatever it is that the Bulls training staff does to keep the overworked Chicago stars running it back out for another 40+ minute night, every night. This time around, the Cavaliers are the team that is missing a key piece. In what any reasonable person can assume was a non-intentional but serious injury to Kevin Love, the Bulls have been gifted a near-equalizer.
The injury to Love is particularly important to this series as the Cavaliers went 3-1 against the Bulls in the regular season. Their only loss against the Bulls this season was a game Kevin Love did not play.
The Bulls also catch the break in the suspension department. While both teams advanced past their first round opponents as expected, they also were both involved in some fiery exchanges. While J.R. Smith or Kendrick Perkins taking a cheap whack is unsurprising, it was a poorly timed series of events for the Cavaliers title ambitions. J.R. Smith will miss Games 1 and 2 of the series for his suspension, while Mike Dunleavy will avoid suspension for his somewhat less awful looking jabs at Michael Carter-Williams and Giannis Antetokounmpo.
The Cavaliers hold the home court advantage and have Lebron James. The Bulls love to play against Lebron James and have the new and improved Jimmy Butler. The biggest test between the two teams will be the Cavaliers and their ISO heavy offensive stretches against an underperforming Bulls defense.
If the Bulls hope to advance to the Conference Finals, they will need to take advantage of the shorthanded Cavs in the first two games of the series. If they do not take a split or series lead back to Chicago when J.R. Smith will return, it probably won’t be enough even if Kevin Love isn’t walking out on that floor anytime soon.
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