DETROIT — After the game, Cleveland Cavaliers head coach Kenny Atkinson was asked what it took for this team to overcome a nine-point deficit in the final three minutes to complete the comeback.
James Harden, who was waiting in the back of the press-conference room for his coach to finish up, thought he would just answer it himself.
“Balls,” Harden said.
While crass, it’s the truth.
The Cavaliers have been called soft for years, and understandably so. They’ve folded in the biggest moments too often in the previous three years not to be called that.
However, this isn’t that team. At least it wasn’t in Game 5.
The Cavs were down nine against the Detroit Pistons with three minutes left in the fourth quarter. The building was on fire. The hometown fans were celebrating what they assumed would be a win. Any momentum that the Cavs had from a strong second half was completely gone.
But then they did something that they hadn’t previously done. They got off the mat.
The Cavs counterpunched with a Donovan Mitchell layup and seven-straight points from Evan Mobley. This was coupled with stifling defense on the other end, as they didn’t give Cade Cunningham anything easy going to the basket.
Cleveland needed overtime to get this game over the line, but they got the job done 117-113.
It wasn’t pretty, but a win is a win. And probably the best victory this group has had since LeBron James was last in town.
Now, they just need one more win to go to the Eastern Conference Finals.
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This game was why you grabbed James Harden at the deadline. President of Basketball Operations Koby Altman’s reasoning at the time was simple.
“[We’re] really excited about when it gets to a chaotic time in the playoffs and we’re on the road, and there’s a fever pitch, being able to throw the ball to him and calm this thing down,” Altman said back in February.
Those words proved to be prophetic. Time and time again, it was Harden who came through. He settled the team down and ensured that they got good offense time and time again in a game they weren’t getting much from Mitchell.
Harden continually got to his spots possession after possession, as if it were 2018 again. And even when you let an older version of Harden get to his spots, he’s going to make you pay.
All of the shanagans that drew the ire of NBA fans for a decade and a half were on full display. Harden baited fouls with the rip through, his endless pump fakes, and his ability to get to the rim and have guys bounce off him.
So much so that he had an entire arena chanting “f*** James Harden” throughout overtime when he was continually parading to the charity stripe.
Aging stars can turn back the clock. The issue is that the consistency may not be there from night to night like it was in their prime. We’ve seen that at times throughout this series, when Harden has had issues with turnovers, which partially led to their collapse in Games 1 and 2. But when the Cavs have needed him this series, he’s more than answered the bell.
In Game 3, he closed the Pistons out with clutch shots. In Game 4, he kept the offense going and took care of the ball, playing a supporting role alongside Mitchell, and in Game 5, he dropped 30 points.
“He really understands the moment,” Atkinson said. “When to get a guy the ball, when to try to get a free-throw. All of it. [This was] the big reason we got him.”
Moving to a role like this has been an adjustment for Harden, and one that he’s not fully used to yet.
“I’ve only been here two and a half months,” Harden said. “The things that we’re going through is all new. Learning how to be a second option and feed and play off Donovan.”
Nights like this show that he does still have it when the team needs something.
Before the game, Kenny Atkinson said they needed a role player to step up to help them reverse their fortunes on the road.
“I just think we need someone to step up,” Atkinson said before the game. “It’s going to be someone you don’t expect.”
That someone was Max Strus.
Strus kept a somewhat lifeless offense alive at the beginning of the game. His four triples in the first half accounted for a majority of the team’s threes (6-14).
In the second half, he was seemingly everywhere on the court, coming up with every loose ball and playing great defense on Cade Cunningham.
“The things that he’s doing don’t necessarily show up on a stat sheet,” Harden said.
What did show up on the stat sheet was a much-needed 20-point performance off the bench.
“He’s got a nasty character, and I love it,” Atkinson said. “We need that.”
Donovan Mitchell simply didn’t have it in Game 5.
The Cavs have gone as Mitchell has this entire season. When he’s getting downhill and getting into the basket, Cleveland’s offense looks good. When he isn’t, things can look stagnant as they did at times in Game 5.
Detroit made shrinking the floor a priority. They walled off the paint by shifting help defense into driving lanes whenever he got the ball on the perimeter. This resulted in Mitchell attempting just two of his 18 shots at the rim.
When he’s not getting to the rim, he isn’t getting to the free-throw line either. Mitchell took just six free throws after getting 15 in the game before.
But the Cavs were able to overcome it still. That shows in part how this group is different, and not the same one we’ve seen in years past.
Additionally, the Cavs lost the possession game. They were outscored 27-16 in points off turnovers and 15-14 in second-chance points.
This wasn’t a pretty game, but again, that doesn’t matter on days like this.
Cade Cunningham was the star the Pistons needed him to be, until he wasn’t.
Cleveland’s defenders were already trapping him throughout Game 4 due to how few of Detroit’s role players were stepping up. That ramped up in Game 5 with sharpshooter Duncan Robinson missing this game with a lower back injury.
The extra attention didn’t matter.
Cunningham did a good job of moving off-ball to create advantages, and then when he got the ball, he made his move to the basket quickly before the help defense could arrive.
And when he was the primary ball handler, he accepted the trap and trusted his teammates to find the advantage out of the odd-man situation. More often than not, they did. This led to Cunningham scoring 20 points on 7-14 shooting in the first half.
Then things changed.
The Cavs found success in the second half by just switching these ball screens. They trusted the defenders to stay with him in isolation. Cunningham sought out the mismatches, but doing so tired him out. That showed through down the stretch, particularly in overtime, where he registered just two points and a turnover.
Cleveland simply wore Cunningham down. This is where Detroit’s lack of depth — especially with Jalen Duren struggling as he has — showed through most and cost them the game.
Mobley came through in the biggest moment.
He didn’t register a single point in the fourth quarter until the final three minutes. He scored Cleveland’s last seven points, which included making two free throws to send the game to overtime. That was impactful for someone who seemingly forgot how to make foul shots in the middle of the season.
Mobley did this while being by far the best player on the floor. He shut off drives to the basket by merely rotating over. His impact on that end — maybe even more than the offense — is what allowed Cleveland to climb out of the hole late.
On top of that, he was excellent as a playmaker in the short roll with a team-best eight assists.
The series isn’t over yet.
Despite how this game ended, Detroit has proven to be an incredibly resilient group. That makes Game 6 at home so much more important.
“I’ve been in this position before, and have lost this next Game 6, then that puts a lot of pressure on you in Game 7, especially if you have to go on the road,” Atkinson said. “It’s a must-win game for us in terms of if we want to move forward.”
