Darius Garland, Jarrett Allen try to point out the reasons for the Cavs’ inconsistencies

The Cleveland Cavaliers“The biggest feature of the season has been their inconsistencies. Whether it’s effort, focus or conditioning, The Cavs have a less-than-stellar 15-12 record in mid-December.

On the other hand, Cleveland has plenty of time to figure things out, and advanced stats suggest the team has both a top-10 offense and defense despite what’s happened so far.

Darius GarlandDean Wade and Jarrett Allen are the longest tenured Cavs. They’ve been through a lot for nearly five years side by side, and Garland and Wade began their careers together in Cleveland in 2019. Knowing the trials and tribulations it takes to get to this pointa mediocre start to the year — barely into the winter season — shouldn’t make them flinch despite the challenge at the moment.

“It’s pretty frustrating. I don’t know if it’s, like, the most frustrating I’ve been through,” Wade said after Tuesday’s practice. “We had a year where we won 17 games; that was pretty frustrating. With this much talent, and we’re playing hard, doing the right things, it’s frustrating not seeing shots fall when they would. And I think the most frustrating thing is that we’re doing everything right. We’re going in the right process and we’re going in the right direction and it’s in the right direction. It’s in the right direction. frustrating.

“But I wouldn’t say it’s the most frustrating thing I’ve been in because we still have that belief. We know we have the talent to come out of this on the right side. So it’s frustrating, but obviously we know we’re a better team than what we’re showing. We’ve just got to fix some things, get back to some things, get back to some things” even remember this frustrating part.”

Garland had similar feelings Wade on Sunday night. After Cleveland’s inexplicable home loss to the Charlotte Hornets, he cited the constant fumbles of necessity and push-pull combinations that prevented Cleveland from putting together 48 minutes of its true brand of basketball. Garland thinks it’s about rediscovering their identity when they’re all reunited.

“I think this whole locker room is positive, even the coaching staff,” Garland said. “I mean, everybody’s positive. We know what we’re capable of. We know what we’ve got in this locker room, and we just have to find it. It’s not on them in there, it’s just on these 15 in this locker room. What do we want to do, what do we really want to accomplish and how do we get through this funk? Because we’ve all been through adversity in the last year. Now let’s try to figure it out so we can take those steps in the right direction, where we really want to be later in season.”

“We had a lot of guys come in and out, we had some bad rebounds here and there, people weren’t shooting well,” Wade added. “We’re still out there, playing hard, doing the right things. It’s like, sometimes things just don’t fall. Loose balls go the wrong way, stuff like that. So it’s unfortunate, but I’m not sure exactly where the inconsistencies are coming from. But, you know, it’s still early.

Allen was the only one of the three who attributed the fight to a lack of confidence.

“I feel like we know we’re a good team,” Allen said. “We know we have all that ability to do it, but sometimes we all get down on ourselves. Sometimes you wonder. I think if we go back to how we were last year, where we don’t question if we could do it or how far we’re going to go, I think that’s going to be good for us.”

When it came to figuring out the “why” behind the Cavs’ lack of consistency, the trio provided different perspectives. Regardless of how either of them fares, Cleveland needs to be better from here on out — or things could get messy quickly.

“There’s still no excuse,” Garland said. “The guys over there are more than capable of winning basketball games and really competing at a high level. So there’s no excuse for that. You just have to find the energy and the competition, the spirit again.”

“I think we handled it well,” Allen added. “We could have quit. You know, it’s been a tough three, four weeks now with how our game is, and we could have easily quit. We could have said maybe this season wasn’t for us, but every single trial we’ve gone through, we’ve faced it head on, and I think we’ll continue to do that.”