Cavs Hornets game 2 preview

 Game 2:  Hey we now have the smallest amount of official data for a game preview, lets go nuts!

In game 1 the Cavs went big with three players listed at 6’11 or more in their starting lineup while the Hornets only have one such starter, one such player in the full lineup, and only two players even on the roster with one being rookie Kai Jones, however that doesn’t mean that the Hornets played small, instead they went medium, with their shortest starter listed at 6’5 and only one rotation player below that.  That will change to two rotation players and one starter listed under 6’5 if Rozier is good to go off his ankle injury.

Indiana’s undersized front court allowed Donatas Sabonis to put up a 33/15/2 game on 21 TS attempts, albeit with 6 TOs, but their perimeter oriented second big Turner only got off 6 FGAs, and had a 9/7/1 with 4 blocks and 4 TOs line.  A straightforward interpretation of this is that Charlotte’s wing-heavy lineup had issues keeping a paint oriented big down, but didn’t have an issue tracking a jump shooting big, and managed to use length and athleticism to force turnovers.  

Checking on that hypothesis however it fails to capture what actually happened in the game.  Sabonis did relatively little (I counted four points) out of traditional post ups, and scored heavily out of the pick and roll and the pick and pop game going 4/6 from 3.  Duarte and Brogdon both also had big nights (27/5/1 and 28/4/11 respectively) and their highlights heavily featured Sabonis in a screening role giving them open 3s and lanes to the basket.

How the Cavs attempt to exploit this size mismatch will be interesting, they have more size up front than Indiana, and have all the skills across their players that Indiana has but without that complete package that Sabonis showed off in any one of them.  Charlotte will not have to worry about Jarrett Allen popping out for a 3 after a screen, and they won’t have to panic about Love rolling to the hoop on his screens.  Markkanen can do both, though as a lesser roll man and he will also likely have a wing on him rather than Plumlee who was exploited pretty heavily.

However they go I would look for Rubio to be a major beneficiary of the Cavs size advantage in this game.  

Charlotte was carried by Lemelo (31/9/7) and Hayward (27/5/3) in their season opener.  Lemelo was light at scoring on drives, only scoring 4 points on drives- though generating multiple assists off his penetration- while scoring heavily from outside (7/9 from 3) and in transition.  Hayward scored off the dribble, in the post, in transition and off catch and shoot, he’s versatile and took advantage of Indiana’s lack of small forward due to injuries, which is something the Cavs have to watch out for considering their lack of SF due to drafting.  

Rotations get a little complicated with both Rozier and Garland both being questionable, Rozier hasn’t had any issue scoring against the SexLand duo averaging ~ 31/4/4 over the last two years against the Cavs, and if he plays the Cavs will need Okoro to defend well with their bigs helping, and possible get some Lamar Stevens mins in to slow down that guard duo.  If Garland sits, that opens up a straight line to always having at least one of Rubio/Okoro on the floor to defend those positions, but if not the Cavs are going to have to show better than they did against Morant on Wednesday.

The Cavs won’t have many better opportunities to exploit their size advantage than against the Hornets, but they will need to keep their turnovers under control to win this particular game.