For a while there, it looked as if the Cavaliers would regret their decision to deliberately throw the last contest of the regular season to take the fourth seed in the East heading into the playoffs. A favorable result against the lowly Hornets would have placed them second and in a collision course with the Sixers, who were then riding a hot streak of eight straight wins. The latter likewise appeared to be a worse matchup on paper vis-a-vis the relatively inexperienced Magic. As they stared at the prospect of losing a Game Seven against their preferred opponents, however, not a few pundits wondered if they wrongly tempted fate.
As things turned out, the Cavaliers would go on to claim their do-or-die affair the other day on the strength of an otherworldly showing from immediate past All-NBA selection Donovan Mitchell. To be sure, it helped that the Magic outside of resident All-Star Paolo Banchero melted under the klieg lights; the pressure to perform with survival at stake proved to be too much to bear for supposed stalwarts Franz Wagner and Jalen Suggs, who shot one of 15 and two of 13 from the field, respectively, to ensure defeat.
That said, the Cavaliers have no reason to rest on their laurels. They may have won the battle, but they’re slated to lose the war. With the juggernaut Celtics waiting in the wings, they will be hard-pressed to advance to the conference finals. There’s a reason the green and white have practically lapped the rest of the National Basketball Association, and nothing the wine and gold have shown so far gives any indication that they can keep pace. At this point, avoiding the broomstick looks to be an achievement in and of itself.
Perhaps the Cavaliers will catch lightning in a bottle and overcome the odds. Perhaps Mitchell has another best-of-seven series’ worth of heroics in him. The flipside, of course, is that they likewise need the Celtics to all but fold the way the Magic did — an extremely unlikely proposition for last year’s East finalists. Which is not to say they won’t try their best. It’s just that their best doesn’t seem to be anywhere near the same zip code as good enough.
Anthony L. Cuaycong has been writing Courtside since BusinessWorld introduced a Sports section in 1994. He is a consultant on strategic planning, operations and human resources management, corporate communications, and business development.
