The Cleveland Cavaliers may be the defending champs but they have not looked like it throughout the month of March.
Losing to the Chicago Bulls 99-93 on Thursday, the Cavs are now 6-10 in March, which is the first time a LeBron James-led team has had a double-digit loss total in a month since November 2003. James was a rookie fresh out of high school then and that was his first full month in the NBA.
The loss also caused the Cavs to slide down in the standings yet again. The Celtics are back to being the No. 1 seed in the East, and if Cleveland continues to struggle to close out the season, it seems very likely that Boston will remain on top.
But despite all of the losing, James is remaining optimistic and believes the Cavs are simply in a “bad spot” right now. Kyrie Irving has a similar view on Cleveland’s struggles and hinted that the team may have had a meeting after losing to the Bulls.
From ESPN’s Brian Windhorst:
“We’re just in a bad spot right now. Not disappointed with the effort. We’re just in a bad spot,” James said following the Cavs’ fifth loss in the past seven games. “We’re going to try to figure it out. … I think the effort was there. I just don’t think the concentration for as close to 48 minutes is there yet. Which is unfortunate.”
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“Every journey’s different. When you’re in it, it absolutely sucks, when you’re in a rut like this,” Irving said. “We’re taking steps forward. After the game we took a step forward.”
Irving declined to elaborate on what took place after the game.
Cleveland’s confidence, despite their struggles, isn’t too surprising to hear. The Cavs after all are the defending champs, have superstar talent with James, Irving and another All-Star in Kevin Love. Cleveland also has plenty of other excellent talent with J.R. Smith, Tristan Thompson, Kyle Korver, Deron Williams, Channing Frye and Richard Jefferson. This is a deep — but right now, they just simply can’t figure things out.
But as Irving indicates, there isn’t any real need for the Cavs to panic. They are struggling in the regular season, not the playoffs. Plus, both Love and Smith are still working their way back from injuries and Korver is out with an injury as well. This would be a whole different animal if the Cavs were playing inconsistently in the postseason.
However, Cleveland rolling over on defense should be the main concern for the Cavs. In the month of March, the Cavs rank 29th in defensive rating, allowing 113.7 points per 100 possessions. That is just dreadful, and not a promising sign for a championship contending team like the Cavs.
The good news for Cleveland is that there are eight more games left in their season, which should give them a good amount of time to ramp up their defensive effort and develop some momentum as they head into the postseason. If they don’t, that bad spot James talked about could extend into the playoffs and perhaps even ruin Cleveland’s dreams of defending their title.
“To be perfectly honest, we’re probably all over the place,” Irving said of the team’s mental state. “It’s no time to kind of back up into the wall and panic. I’m not panicking and I don’t think anyone in this locker room should panic. We’re going to be just fine. It’s ugly right now. It’s real, real ugly. But we’ll get out of this, we’ll be fine.”