Checking In On Franklin Gutierrez
March 19, 2008A Buckeye At Last!!!
March 19, 2008Detroit Pistons (49-18) vs Cleveland Cavaliers (38-30)
Quicken Loans Arena, Cleveland, OH
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
8:00 PM EST
ESPN/FSN OH/WUAB, WTAM
Yet another game in the Cavaliers-Pistons rivalry. It’s tough in any rivalry when you’re consistently the underdog, but after actually beating the Pistons in the Eastern Conference Finals last year, you want to believe the Cavs are now on equal footing. Unfortunately, when you look at records, statistics, efficiency, etc….the Cavs fall short of being in the same league as the Pistons this year. But enough doom and gloom. I see two reasons to be excited for this game….1) for once, the Cavaliers are the rested team and their opponent is playing on the road in the back end of back-to-back games, and 2) this is why the Cavaliers made “the trade”. Danny Ferry said what we all felt deep down inside, and that is that the Cavaliers were not good enough to get through Detroit and Boston and Orlando in the playoffs, so he made the trade. Now, after failing in their first 2 tests against the East leaders with the new roster (a 92-87 loss to Boston on Feb. 27th and the 104-90 loss to Orlando the other night), the Cavaliers will try once again to prove that this new lineup can hang with the big boys. We’ll see what happens.
Projected Starting Lineups
Detroit Pistons:
-G Chauncey Billups (17.6 ppg, 7.0 apg, 1.4 spg, 24.22 PER)
-G Richard Hamilton (17.8 ppg, 4.2 apg, .453 3-pt%, 18.48 PER)
-F Tayshaun Prince (13.8 ppg, 4.8 rpg, 3.3 apg, 15.92 PER)
-F Antonio McDyess (8.9 ppg, 8.9 rpg, 0.7 bpg, 13.87 PER)
-C Rasheed Wallace (13.2 ppg, 7.0 rpg, 1.7 bpg, 17.60 PER)
Key Injuries: None
Cleveland Cavaliers:
-G Delonte West (7.7 ppg, 3.5 apg, .340 3-pt%, 10.92 PER)
-G Sasha Pavlovic (7.8 ppg, 1.7 apg, .306 3-pt%, 7.51 PER)
-F LeBron James (30.9 ppg, 8.1 rpg, 7.5 apg, 30.16 PER)
-F Ben Wallace (5.2 ppg, 8.7 rpg, 1.6 bpg, 11.94 PER)
-C Zydrunas Ilgauskas (13.4 ppg, 9.5 rpg, 1.7 bpg, 18.27 PER)
Key Injuries: Daniel Gibson (Out), Eric Snow (Out)
Team Efficiency Stats
Detroit Pistons:
-Off (98.6 ppg, 41.0 rpg, .461 FG%, .762 FT%, 22.9 apg, Efficiency-108.8, Rank-6)
-Def (90.8 ppg, 39.3 rpg, .438 FG%, Efficiency-100.6, Rank-4)
Cleveland Cavaliers:
-Off (97.3 ppg, 44.3 rpg, .440 FG%, .720 FT%, 19.8 apg, Efficiency-103.4, Rank-17)
-Def (97.7 ppg, 40.8 rpg, .457 FG%, Efficiency-104.1, Rank-13)
Game Notes
Tonight could be a historic night for LeBron James and the Cavaliers. With 35 points, LeBron will pass Brad Daugherty for first place in Cavaliers’ history in points scored. It’s tough to drop 35 on the Pistons, but with LeBron, there’s always the chance.
The Cavaliers have been an excellent home team this year, going 22-10 (.688) in the Q, and they have won 7 straight at home. They are 4-1 against the Central Division at home. The problem for the Cavaliers is that they just have not been playing good, consistent basketball as of late. They really look like they are going through the motions at times and the energy levels have been extremely low. This could be very problematic when facing the NBA’s premiere backcourt of Chauncey Billups and Richard Hamilton. These guys are dynamite, and they make every game against them a chore. If you look at stats alone, the comparisons between Cleveland’s backcourt and Detroit’s look grim. However, Delonte and Sasha have actually playing very well lately. In their last 3 games, West has averaged 11.0 ppg, 5.0 rpg, 4.7 apg, and 1.0 bpg while Sasha has averaged 16.3 ppg while shooting .438 from 3-pt land and .543 overall. It will be absolutely essential that these 2 guards keep it up in this game. The other “hot” Cavalier is, of course, LeBron. Following up his Player Of The Month awards in January and February, how has he followed them up in March? In 9 games he’s averaging 35.3 ppg, 8.0 rpg, and 6.9 apg, scoring 30 or more in 7 of the 9 games.
Detroit’s average of 90.3 possessions per game is the lowest in the NBA. The Pistons absolutely love to slow the game down and force you to try to grind it out with them. The good news is that this is the kind of game the Cavaliers seem to be the best at right now. The bad news is that despite the low number of possessions, the Pistons are unbelievably efficient and they make every one count. I’ve already mentioned their backcourt, but it’s not like their frontcourt is any weaker. Tayshaun Prince is one of the more versatile players in the NBA, and even though he’s not a guy that’s going to push anyone around, his length makes him very capable of defending post up players and he’s quite the handful to defend as well. An potentially interesting matchup could be when Rasheed and Ben Wallace find themselves matched up with each other.
The key to this game, as I see it, is to not allow the Pistons to dictate what kind of offense the Cavaliers play. They allowed the Spurs to do it in the NBA Finals last year, and it was a disaster. When the Cavs attempt 30 or more FTs, they are 17-3 this year. They are 25-10 in games in which they attempt 25 or more free throws. Conversely, when they shoot 20 or fewer, they are 4-11 and they are just 12-20 when attempting fewer than 25 free throws. This means that it will terribly important that LeBron is agressive going to the basket in this game. When he is doubled, his teammates need to attack the paint and LeBron needs to try to get them the ball in position to go to the hole where they can draw fouls. If the Cavaliers allow themselves to be made into a pure jump shooting team, this will not end well. If you look back to the memorable Game 5 of the Eastern Conference Finals last year, the way LeBron and the Cavs were able to take advantage of the series was when LeBron was at his most agressive and going to the basket. The Cavaliers have been shooting entirely too many 3’s lately, and this will be the perfect opponent to change that trend against.
Vegas Line
Cleveland -1
Over/Under 183.5
From The Outside Looking In
Need4Sheed.com
Detroit Bad Boys
PistonsNationBlog
Full Court Press-MLive.com
Pistons Palace
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