The Cavaliers left Game 4 with the wrong message

The Cavaliers left Game 4 with the wrong impression of where things went wrong. 

The Cleveland Cavaliers needed to be perfect without Donovan Mitchell and Jarrett Allen to beat the Boston Celtics. They weren’t. The Cavaliers were less introspective and more focused on the outside factors at play during the post-game press conferences.

“You know, I will be honest with you, I was disappointed with the way the whistle blew tonight,” J.B. Bickerstaff said. “I thought our guys deserved much better the way that they were competing, attacking the paint… We are not asking for anything more, but we are asking for equal and I do not think we got an equal opportunity from that standpoint.”

The players echoed a similar sentiment.

“Seven free throw attempts in 48 minutes is really tough,” Darius Garland responded when asked about the officiating in Game 4. “I know how many times I get hit. I know how many times my teammates get hit, put on the floor, and we can’t reciprocate it. It’s tough.”

“I wouldn’t say they were more aggressive going to the rim than we were,” Caris LeVert said. “I just feel like we both were aggressive going to the rim, sometimes that happens like that.”

To blame the officials rather than their own faults is the wrong message. It’s fair to emphasize Boston shot 17 more free throws than Cleveland (24-to-7 disparity). However, the lack of calls is an invalid excuse for why they ended up losing the game.

The Cavaliers gave Boston an admirable fight, even overcoming a 13-point deficit they faced early in the second quarter. They came out with their best punch, playing to Boston’s style of offense and matching them punch for punch until roughly the two-minute mark in the fourth quarter.

The Cavaliers headed into the last minute thirty of the game on a 14-4 run and needed to execute down the stretch and that’s where the game slipped away from them. The Cavaliers would have a litany of options for what caused their falter when it became crunch time.

One point that could have been addressed was Max Strus taking a deeply contested three with ten seconds left on the shot clock or the fact that once Jaylen Brown corralled the rebound Strus committed his sixth foul causing him to foul out. Now, Strus not only botched a late-game possession but also forced the Cavaliers in need of keeping offensive threats on the floor, to thrust Sam Merrill, whom the Celtics have targeted defensively, into the game.

The Cavaliers’ defense also had limited options and couldn’t close out the Celtics’ offense. The offensive firepower the Celtics have is hard on a Cleveland defense that cannot handle Boston’s wings when healthy. Nevertheless, without both of the primary wings in Strus fouling out and Isaac Okoro essentially unplayable after one of his worst playoff games this season. These reasons led to Jayson Tatum getting his matchup of choice (Garland) and blowing by him only to have LeVert crash for help leaving Jaylen Brown open for what the game-sealing three.

Overall, the Cavaliers showed a lot of fight and played as close to a perfect game as they could muster considering who was available. The team fought, clawed, and scraped their way only to then stand on their soapbox and complain that the way the whistle blew was a detriment to the team.

Moral victories or not, losing a playoff game will always sting. The Cavaliers, when it came down to the brass tacks, simply did not execute in crunch time. Execution was the deciding factor, for as wavering as the Celtics were in the closing stretch, they buckled down when the Cavaliers faltered.

No referee calls decided why the Cavaliers did not win on Monday night. When the team looks back at those last few possessions they will be able to see the sobering tale of the tape that they beat themselves.