Intensity & effort: Psychology of the 2015 NBA playoffs – conference finals

In the 2015 NBA Conference Finals, both the Cavaliers and the Warriors had commanding 3-0 leads over the Hawks and the Rockets.

No team has ever come back from a 3-0 deficit to win a series, with only 3 teams managing to force a Game 7.

In 1951, the New York Kicks forced a Game 7 against the Rochester Royals in the Finals, then in 19… hold on… this isn’t even remotely interesting. However, I did uncover this little gem of trivia via that there Twitter.

If #Warriors win tonight and #Cavs tomorrow, this will be the first time since 1957 that East and West Finals ended in a sweep.

— Martin Wenzl NBA (@WenzlNBA) May 25, 2015

The Cavs did their part and trounced the Hawks in Game 4, but we were denied the double sweep as the Warriors completely forgot how to play basketball in Game 4 of their series with the Rockets. James Harden annoyingly managed to annoy his way to 45 annoying points forcing an annoying game 5, but then the Warriors remembered that they were actually quite good at basketball.

The Story of The Conference Finals

So what was the story of the round? If Round 1 was about the weight of expectation, and Round 2 was about developing a last shot mentality, two individual performers caught my attention in the Conference Finals, and they had two things in common: Intensity and Effort.

Most of the headlines went to Matthew Dellavedova of the Cleveland Cavaliers. In Game 2 he dove for a loose ball and rolled into Hawks’ sharpshooter, Kyle Korver, who suffered an ankle sprain in the collision.

This wasn’t seen as a big deal until the next game, when Dellavedova got tangled up with Hawks’ big man, Al Horford, falling into his knees. Horford retaliated… sort of… and was ejected from the game. Was Dellavedova guilty of playing dirty, setting out to injure the opposition by deliberately targeting knees and ankles?

Honestly, I don’t think so. I think he was just playing with intensity, sacrificing his body and going for the ball. Was it sometimes a little reckless? Absolutely. When playing a sport like basketball, you have to have some degree of awareness of what you’re doing, and how you might injure other players, but you cannot fault Dellavedova’s intensity and effort during the series.

“What do intensity and effort have in common? They’re both things that you can control.”

The Big Man on The Boards

The other standout performance for me, was Tristan Thompson. If I were picking teams, I’d pick Tristan Thompson first (edit: I have revised this opinion since I first wrote this post!). Seriously. He is the epitome of hard work. Thompson is a player who will bring intensity and effort every night, and he dominated the boards against Atlanta.

Thompson models himself on Dennis Rodman, another player who knew his skills were limited, but is a student of the game, and boy does he work. His efforts in the Atlanta series certainly got him some attention and a big contract offer (edit: the less said about how this turned out the better!).

Control

So we’ve got two players here. Both players who normally come off the bench. Both players who know they aren’t the most skilled, the fastest, the strongest, or the best shooters. But they both know and understand their roles and what they can bring to the team, and they both bring intensity and effort on every single possession that they’re involved in. What do intensity and effort have in common? They’re both things that you can control.

If you’re shot isn’t falling, what can you control? If you’ve committed a couple of turnovers, what can you control? If you’re not feeling great, what can you control? You can control effort and you can control intensity. And whatever else you bring to the game, if you bring those things, just like Dellavedova and Thompson, you’ll get noticed.