CLEVELAND — The Cavaliers have gotten back to their roots, their backbone, their identity. And it's one of the biggest reasons why they're heading to Orlando with a 2-0 series lead after Monday night's 96-86 Game 2 win .
The defense-first Cavs that teams seem to hate playing against are back. And the Magic have had no answer on that end of the floor.
The Cavaliers had the league's top-ranked defense when they went on their most torrid stretch of the season and briefly grabbed hold of the No. 2 spot in the East. But injuries, along with a less effective defense, eventually led them to drop to No. 4.
Over the last month of the regular season, the Cavs were a below-league-average defensive team, which almost had them as an unrecognizable group considering that coach J.B. Bickerstaff had made it the team's calling card dating back a few years ago.
The vintage defense — if it can be called that, considering it's only going back three or four months — has returned in the playoffs, as the Cavs stifled the Magic in Games 1 and 2, not giving up a single inch on that end of the floor.
"I think it's the moment and the purpose," Bickerstaff said when asked about how the team had rediscovered its defensive identity. "Having a week of practice [before the series started] helps. If you look at that last month of March, we didn't have any practice days. So inventively without practice, you have slippage."
The Cavaliers defense hasn't slipped up once in two games in this series.
Holding any team to under 100 points in a game in today's NBA is quite the feat. The Cavs haven't allowed the Magic to even reach 90 yet (83 points in Game 1, 86 in game 2). Part of that is simply that the Magic haven't been shooting well. But a large portion of the credit will go to the Cavs defense for making life as difficult as possible.
The Cavs said they've been able to dictate Orlando 's shot selection.
"I thought we did a great job of forcing them to the shots that we wanted and conceding nothing, and that's one of our messages," Bickerstaff said. "Very few shots that they took tonight weren't contested, and the majority of them were highly contested."
The Cavs held the Magic to just 36.3 percent shooting from the field in Game 2, and 25.7 percent from 3-point range. In Game 1 they did even better against Orlando, holding it to 32.6 percent from the floor and 21.6 percent from 3-point range.
"Just taking the challenge," said Donovan Mitchell when asked about the biggest difference between the second half of the season and now. "I think guys are locked in, guys are executing the game plan and taking the individual challenges."
Of course, much of the credit goes to the defensive interior with center Jarrett Allen and forward Evan Mobley . It's how the Cavs defense is built.
But two additional keys to this defensive fortitude are Isaac Okoro and Caris LeVert, who both come off the bench. The Cavs starting lineup has led the way, but Okoro and LeVert have played key roles in important stretches in both Games 1 and 2.
"Man, big time," Mitchell said when asked about the defensive impact of having Okoro and LeVert. "When you can change coverages — you can switch, you can drop, you can hedge and show — you can do different things when you have two guys like that. … I think it definitely allows us to kind of manipulate the lineups and throw different looks at people."
The Cavs have led wire to wire in both games of the series. They've been the type of unrelenting force that Bickerstaff has been aiming to see. But they know the next test will be a difficult one against a Magic team that has been much better at home.
Games 3 and 4 of the series will be in Orlando. If the Cavs are serious about re-establishing themselves as a defensive force, they know they'll need to do it away from Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse. Games 1 and 2 couldn't have gone much smoother on the defensive side. Games 3 and 4 will be the true tests, though.
"Gotta find a way to quiet down that arena," Mitchell said. "They're going to hit shots that night they missed on the road. It's just how the playoffs go. We'll be ready for that."
Ryan Lewis can be reached at rlewis1@gannett.com. Follow him on Threads at @ByRyanLewis .
This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Cleveland Cavaliers defense has Orlando Magic on the playoffs brink
