3-pointer: What we learned from Cavaliers-Hawks Game 3

Jenni Queen · Anmeldungsdatum: 01.01.2023 Beiträge: 3

A series dominated by the 3-point-shooting, baby-faced Cavaliers over the ball-moving, style-and-grace Atlanta Hawks. Atlanta with its polite demeanor and comments, built-to-be-boring publicly by the Popovich way, and the show-and-go Cavs, wearing hats, tweeting #TheLand every ten seconds, talking about "growing" and "learning."

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So how could this series feel like such a brutal battle of attrition, and how could it be decided by the Cavaliers' physicality and ability to play through injury? When did this become the series decided by injuries, and not the ones to the Cavs? How did this become the one where players were limping and groaning as they exited the arena, and where a superstar collapsed to the floor in exhaustion after Cleveland's 114-111 overtime victory Sunday?

By hook, by crook, by Cleveland's Matthew Dellavedova or Atlanta's Al Horford, by cramp or by crutch, Hawks-Cavs went from a basketball game to a wrestling match Sunday night. Fueled in part by the Hawks' desperation, down 0-2 and short-handed, and in part because the Cavaliers, also short-handed, are simply man-handling the Hawks with their size advantage but are also continually racking up injuries beyond the guys who are on the shelf. Nineteen offensive rebounds don't tell the full story, nor does the controversial play by Horford, landing an elbow on Dellavedova after the Cavs guard boxed out Horford, was drug to the ground, and then landed or pushed his way into Horford's knee.