The Cleveland Cavaliers showed their teeth again on Tuesday night.
They trailed by as many as 15 points and still managed to win by 22 with a 43-23 fourth quarter.
Even so, the fact that they had to tread water again to get the win is a bit of a worrisome trend.
That’s why Jarrett Allen was far from satisfied with his team’s performance.
Following the win, the star big man called the team out for this new bad habit of falling behind and digging themselves into big holes early in games (via Cleveland.com):
“It’s definitely a bad habit. We all know it is,” Jarrett Allen said. “We have these slow starts that we need to get rid of. When we start playing teams that are going to be in the playoffs, they are going to attack us early and we can’t always go down first and have to fight back. Makes it so much harder.”
Of course, they’ve survived most of those games, but that’s not the point.
Just like Allen said, that’s something they might not be able to come back from come playoff time.
Perhaps they can afford to do so vs. struggling teams like the Chicago Bulls, and coming back from a 22-point deficit vs. the reigning NBA champions Boston Celtics was remarkable, but that’s still a worrisome trend.
The only silver lining from these slow starts might be that the team has now been battle-tested and put in a tough position multiple times throughout the course of the season.
This will give them a big confidence boost ahead of the playoffs, and even if they find themselves in a tough spot, they might feel like they have what it takes to get back on track.
Hopefully, that won’t even be necessary, and they will approach the games more seriously from tip-off all the way to the final buzzer.
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