Donovan Mitchell, Darius Garland feel the mutilation

The The Cleveland Cavaliers continue to take one step forward and two steps back. Donovan Mitchell and Darius Garland wasted little time uncovering the Cavs’ craziest feature after their disheartening 99-94 loss to a nine-man Golden State Warriors team.

“We get down and then we start playing,” Mitchell said in the locker room after the game. “There’s no change to turn it around. Until there’s a change in that, we’re going to continue to be in these positions where sometimes we work, sometimes we don’t, and we have to fix that. Until we decide on a consistent basis to be that group, we’re going to run into inconsistency … yeah.”

“I have to play hard for 48 minutes,” Garland added. “Play with some intensity. Play with some energy.”

While Mitchell is credited with short-handed Warriors – esp Pat Spencer and Quinten Post — because he came to play below, he knows that wine and gold must be better.

“One day we’ll figure it out,” Mitchell said, exasperated. “I can’t continue to be in this position. It shouldn’t come down to that. All the things we’ve done and shown, we’re doing in spurts, and that’s what’s rough. We’ve just got to figure out how to go there on a consistent basis.”

Mitchell pointed out as the Cavs closed out the half and began the third quarterwhich gave Golden State confidence. It’s not the first time this has happened.

Remember, too, that this is a Cleveland group that only scored 130 points in a win over the San Antonio Spurs the night before, only to give up 94 points on a putrid 37-of-107 shooting from the field the next contest. Outside of Mitchell, the Wine and Gold went 3 of 28 from long range.

“I mean, it deflates when you miss. Like, it goes down,” the Cleveland coach Kenny Atkinson he said. “I don’t know who would be happy in that situation. It’s just tough. I think we stuck together on the bench and (were) cheering and (talking) about competing. We had (24) offensive rebounds. I know a lot of it was ’cause we missed a lot of shots, but I was like, ‘We’re trying,’ we’re fighting.’ As if we couldn’t get over the hump.

The most puzzling aspect of this game was how the Cavs outscored Golden State by 15 while also getting as many shots as they did on Friday. The problem is that they made 28% below expected field goal percentage on those easy looks.

“I’m not going to fault our effort or our spirit or any of that,” Atkinson said. “The name of the game is putting the ball in the basket at the end of the day … I have to put it in the hole.”

Even with the improved offensive output and despite holding Golden State under 100 points on 38.4% shooting, the consensus was that the defense still needed improvement.

“It goes along, but it’s the opposite side of the ball for us,” Garland said. “We’ve got to bring energy to that side of the ball. I guess it’s tough for us. We’ve got to talk a little more, bring energy to the defensive side of the ball.”

Mitchell believes it starts with better communication, intensity, getting on the glass and starting the fast break. Garland feels as simple as energy, spirit and “will”.

“When you’re not making those shots, you have to have more stops,” Atkinson said. “It was okay-good, but it wasn’t great. We had a fair amount of breakdowns. We’re going to fake shots at the rim. It wasn’t effort stuff. It was more like focus, cognitive errors. So we had to be more perfect defensively than we were.”

After consecutively sharing the weekend, the The Cavs will have until Friday to regroup before their matchup with the Washington Wizards in DC Sporting mid 14-11, it may be just what the doctor ordered.

“It’s obviously a reset,” Mitchell said. “When we come back, we have to be rocking and ready to go.”

“It’s fixable,” Garland added. “Get some rest. Get in the gym. Build energy for the next game.”

Atkinson feels Cleveland needs a break like this to take a breather and get some practice time.

“The schedule will ease up, and we’ll get back on track,” Atkinson said. “But this is a good reset. It gives us time to get some guys healthy, right? Anytime you can buy days in the NBA, guys can recover a little bit.”

“Take advantage of these four days and get better,” Mitchell added. “That’s it.”