New York dominate the 4th quarter to take a 3-1 series lead over Cleveland at star-studded Madison Square Garden
NEW YORK — “There’s nothing like a big game in the Garden.”
Those were the words of New York Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau after his team took a 3-1 lead in its first-round series against the Cleveland Cavaliers with a 102-93 victory at a very loud Madison Square Garden on Sunday afternoon. Here are some notes, numbers and film as the series heads back to Cleveland for Wednesday’s Game 5 (7 ET, NBA TV).
1. Barrett on the attack
RJ Barrett isn’t the best finisher inside as his 51.2% shooting in the paint this season ranked 179th among 204 players with at least 200 attempts. But that’s still much better than Barrett’s effective field goal percentage on shots from outside the paint: 43.9%, 198th among 212 players with at least 200 attempts from the outside.
But in Game 4, Barrett was attacking early and often. The very first play of the game was designed for Barrett to get downhill, with Jalen Brunson handing the ball off to a trailing Barrett, who then got a quick screen from Mitchell Robinson. Barrett got a half step on Caris LeVert and didn’t stop until he got to the rim:
“It kind of set the tone for the rest of the game,” Barrett said of the first play. “We were all in attack mode.”
That’s a good thing, because the two teams combined to shoot 14-for-52 (27%) from 3-point range.
A couple of more times in that first quarter, Barrett got that same half step on LeVert without the benefit of the screen. Barrett was 0-for-6 from outside the paint (all 3-point attempts), but still scored 26 points, shooting 9-for-12 in the paint and 8-for-13 at the line. His 18 points in the paint and his 13 free throw attempts are both tied for the fourth most in his career.
The Knicks started the second half with the same play they ran at the start of the first. This time, Darius Garland switched the handoff and “iced” Barrett to keep him from using the Robinson screen. But the Knicks flipped the screen, Jarrett Allen stepped up and Donovan Mitchell fouled Robinson on a lob from Barrett:
2. Knicks trust their defense
Knicks' defensive scheme making life difficult for Mitchell
The defensive game plan for both of these teams has generally been the same since the Cavs started blitzing Brunson in Game 2. Both defenses have prioritized stopping the opposing lead guard at the expense of leaving shooters open. But the Knicks had more success with that strategy, mostly because they have fewer offensive liabilities.
New York was very willing to leave Isaac Okoro open in the corner in order to help on more dangerous threats. Miles McBride left Okoro in the strong-side corner to draw a charge on Mitchell in the second quarter, and Okoro is now 2-for-10 on corner 3s in the series after going 1-for-5 in Game 4. Evan Mobley has also looked shaky when called on to create his own shot.
“Everyone has to get to the right spots and then you’ve got to make the right play,” Thibodeau said of how to approach a defense that’s blitzing or loading up to the strong side. “Trust the game, trust your reads. Don’t fight it. Get off of it, then move it to the back side and make plays from there. That’s what winning basketball is. That’s the challenge.”
As noted above, the Knicks didn’t exactly shoot well from the outside on Sunday, and Julius Randle killed some possessions on his way to scoring just seven points on 3-for-10 shooting. But New York’s secondary players have generally been better.
3. Glass work
The Cavs had the league’s No. 1 defense in the regular season, but they ranked 20th in defensive rebounding percentage (71.5%), and the Knicks’ 15.3 second-chance points per game against them were the most for any Eastern Conference opponent.
Mobley and Allen played together in just two of the four regular season meetings and the Cavs were a better defensive rebounding team (73.6%) when the two bigs were on the floor together. But even in the 117 total minutes with both of them on the floor in this series, Cleveland has grabbed just 63.1% of available defensive rebounds, an anemic rate.
The Cavs allowed 17 or more offensive rebounds four times in 82 regular season games, and they’ve already allowed 17 twice in this series. Knicks had 23 second-chance points in Game 1 and they had 21 more in Game 4, when the margin in second-chance points (21-12) was the same as the difference in the overall score (102-93). Robinson (7) and Obi Toppin (5) combined for 12 of the Knicks’ 17 offensive boards, but the game was sealed when 6-4 Josh Hart grabbed two in the final two minutes.
Through Game 4, the Cavs rank last in defensive rebounding percentage in the playoffs (62.7%).
4. Same action
There was a 12-possession stretch in the fourth quarter where both teams ran empty-corner pick and rolls four of the six times they had the ball. With the Cavs blitzing Brunson, the Knicks had Barrett set the ball screen, allowing him to pop to the corner and attack a recovering defense:
It’s interesting how a playoff matchup will call for actions/lineups/schemes that you didn’t see much in the regular season. In their 62 regular-season games together, Barrett set exactly 62 ball screens for Brunson, according to Second Spectrum tracking. But through four games of this series, he’s set 22 (5.5 per game).
On the other end of the floor, the Cavs had Mobley setting the screen for Garland. The Knicks were quicker to bring help from the weak side, but that allowed Allen to flash to the middle of the paint:
5. Cavs continue to struggle vs. the best
“Their net rating tells you they’re good,” Thibodeau said of Cleveland after the game.
Indeed, the Cavs ranked second in point differential per 100 possessions (+5.6) in the regular season and were one of three teams that ranked in the top 10 on both ends of the floor.
But a lot of that was built in games against bad teams. Cleveland had the league’s second best record (32-10) and its best point differential (+9.0 per game) against the 14 teams that finished at or below .500. And against the other 15 teams that had winning records, they were 19-21. Only three teams — the Thunder, Clippers and Nets — had a bigger differential between their record vs. the bottom 14 and their record vs. the top 16.
The Knicks were 21-10 in games played between the 16 teams that finished above .500, and they’re now 3-1 in this series. They can close it out Wednesday.
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John Schuhmann is a senior stats analyst for NBA.com. You can e-mail him here, find his archive here and follow him on Twitter.
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