CLEVELAND, Ohio — The final play will be remembered most.
The Portland Trail Blazers came out of the timeout with one goal: Get the ball to superstar Damian Lillard and let him take the final shot. The Cavs knew it. Everybody did.
Lillard stumbled briefly before regathering his footing. He darted toward Robert Covington’s inbounds pass near the top of the key. With Cedi Osman checking him, Lillard received a screen from center Jusuf Nurkic, forcing Jarrett Allen to switch.
Animated crowd. Both benches standing. Lillard dribbled to his left, barely inside the arc, and used his right arm to try to fend off Cleveland’s nimble center. Lillard created a sliver of space, stepped back and fired an off-balance 3-pointer over a leaping Allen.
Brick.
Evan Mobley collected the rebound and the buzzer sounded while Allen received high-fives from teammates. Cleveland hung on for a 107-104 win, pushing it back over .500.
“Dame is one of the best players in this league,” Darius Garland said. “J.A. really moved his feet and kept his hands high and forced him into a difficult shot. That’s all we can ask for and J.A. had a great game. He switched out on a lot of great guards tonight and throughout the entire season. That’s what he does. Slides his feet really well. Came up with a great contest. Came out with a win.”
Defense is Allen’s calling card. He’s recorded at least 90 blocks in three straight seasons and is already one of the league leaders in contested shots. He’s the Cavaliers’ pillar at that end of the floor. That’s how he earned a $100 million contract this past offseason.
But what he did in the moments leading up that stop were most noteworthy.
At the eight-minute mark of the fourth quarter, the feisty Blazers pulled within one. The Cavs had scored just six points in the first four minutes — and the offense was starting to wilt.
Until Allen — not typically regarded as an offensive focal point — showed his evolution and helped thwart Portland’s surge, scoring the next eight Cavs points.
“He was willing to put the pressure on the defense,” Cavs coach J.B. Bickerstaff said. “Everything he does is going at the rim. When you put that type of pressure on people, it’s hard to guard. I’m watching him and his footwork, he’s finishing with the left hand or right hand. He’s got quickness and speed that’s harder for bigger guys to guard. We know when we throw him the ball, he’s gonna get you within two feet and get a good shot. So that’s what we needed at that time.”
First, there was a putback layup. On the ensuing possession, he backed down Lillard following a switch and worked his way to the free-throw line, canning both. Then came a high pick-and-roll with veteran Ricky Rubio that ended with an Allen dunk. Finally, there was a post-up on the left block against Nurkic. Allen spun baseline, drop-stepped, briefly lost the ball, collected it himself and flipped in a tough, right-handed hook shot that led to another Portland timeout.
Allen jogged back to the bench, flexing his muscles — the 10 pounds he added this offseason.
“From a young age that was instilled in me, just the footwork as a big, back to the basket,” Allen said. “Over the summer I made that an emphasis to try to be able to create my own shot. Even though I want to do better than I did in that tonight, I still think I showed that I have the potential to maybe do something else down there. Wanted to show I’ve been working on that and adding it to my game.”
Over those two-plus minutes in the fourth quarter, during a time when the Cavs needed someone to step up, they deliberately fed Allen — and he saved them.
“I’m not used to getting plays called for me,” Allen said with a smile. “I asked for one. That’s unusual for me. But I asked (Bickerstaff) to give me one post-up and he said, ‘Scrap the play and give it to me.’ I was like, ‘OK, I need to do something with it.’ It just showed that he has confidence in the work I did over the summer and going forward.”
Allen made a commitment to sharpen his footwork, face-up game, post-ups and passing this offseason. He worked on finishing with both hands. Tried extending his shooting range. Even though Allen has only taken two 3-pointers this season, missing both, that extra work has clearly helped in other areas.
Once considered a limited offensive player, he’s off to the best start of his career. Allen scored a team-high 24 points in Wednesday’s win — the third time he’s led the Cavaliers in scoring. It’s already the fourth time he’s reached the 20-point mark in the first nine games, accomplishing that just six times in 51 tries during the 2020-21 season.
Allen is one of six Cavaliers averaging double figures. He’s Cleveland’s third-leading scorer, averaging 14.4 points on 70.5% from the field, trailing just Phoenix Suns center JaVale McGee and Utah’s Rudy Gobert.
“I’ve probably had more post-ups this season than my whole career. That’s the honest to God truth,” Allen said. “Trying to find it in the flow of the offense. I don’t want to disrupt us to the point where I’m getting in people’s way. I just want to find my spot.”
He’s found the right balance. Allen leads the Cavs in points per shot attempt, ranking in the 90th percentile among bigs in that category. Despite being a non-threat from the perimeter, he’s also in the 97th percentile in effective field goal percentage — a metric that adjusts field goal percentage to account for the fact that 3s are worth an extra point.
In Year 5, he’s become much more than just a defensive pest and peripheral option on offense. He’s showing that he’s far from a finished product and his ceiling can be lifted higher than many believed.
“Everybody is being aggressive. Everybody is sharing the ball, making the right play, making the easy reads and a lot of it is coming from Jarrett I believe,” Garland said. “He has a lot of focus on him right now, so when he gets in the paint, everybody is cutting, he’s looking for spray-outs and making the easy play. It’s just building confidence for us.”
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