LUE ADMITS IMPROVEMENT WILL BE NEEDED FOR CAVALIERS
Cavaliers CLEVELAND — coach Tyronn Lue still has his critics, even after guiding a roster filled with inconsistent players back to the NBA Finals.
In a sense he agreed with some of them, willingly acknowledging he can improve after the Cavs were swept by the Warriors, losing to Golden State for the third time in the past four years despite the presence of LeBron James.
Lue, 41, said Friday he used the toughness he relied on as an NBA point guard for 11 seasons to get through a season fraught with problems, including his own health issues.
“I know that I’m a tough guy. I pride myself on that,” he said. “I’m hard on myself a lot of times, but I’ve got to realize I’ve only been coaching for 2½ years. It feels like 10 or 15. I can get better, and I’m going to get better.”
With three years left on a five-year, $35 million contract, Lue said he intends to return next season despite being forced to take a leave of absence that spanned nine games over 17 days to address chest pains, problems sleeping and anxiety that at one point had him coughing up blood.
Under Lue, the Cavs are 128-77 in the regular season and 41-20 in the playoffs. They captured the 2016 title and have won three Eastern Conference championships. But they’re 1-8 in the Finals since the Warriors added nine-time All-Star Kevin Durant.
Cavs owner Dan Gilbert tweeted his support for Lue as the Cavs opened the Finals on May 31 at Oakland.
“Ty Lue and staff have stood in there with about as much noise and premature judgment that can be thrown at a coach and guided us back to the dance. Grinders and professionals. Proud of Ty and everyone on the entire staff,” Gilbert said on Twitter that night.
Asked after Game 4 what he learned this season, Lue said, “I just learned that you’ve got to stay the course in this profession. Anything can happen. We had plenty of chances to mail it in, to make excuses, and we didn’t do that. I think it started with me, it started with LeBron with just saying, ‘No excuses.’ And here we are today.
“Despite how good their team is, I thought our guys did a good job of competing. We still have to improve and get better, which we will. But we’re not that far off.”
Lue said there is one aspect of coaching he enjoys that he hasn’t experienced yet. But should James opt out of his contract and leave Cleveland in free agency, that aspect of the job may come into play, especially if Gilbert elects to rebuild.
“Me as a young coach, having older teams, I haven’t been able to really teach and kind of mold younger guys into who you want them to be,” Lue said. “That’s probably the most gratifying. If you get younger guys, you can kind of mold and fit your personality, fit the style you want to play. When you do that and see when they get it, it feels good.
“Like with Jordan (Clarkson) and Rodney Hood and Larry Nance, Cedi (Osman) and those guys, when you get an opportunity to see how to come out in the playoffs and carry it over to next year and see how they’ve grown, that’s what it’s about.”
Stress for Lue began in June, when Gilbert parted ways with general manager David Griffin. Five-time AllStar Kyrie Irving was traded in August. The Cavs were wracked by injuries and new GM Koby Altman blew up the roster at the trade deadline. Lue used 30 different lineups during the regular season and six in the postseason.
There may have been doubts about Lue’s future when the Cavs went 3-10 starting with a Christmas Day loss at Golden State and when the Indiana Pacers took them to Game 7 in the first round. Seeded fourth in the East, the Cavs also survived a Game 7 in the conference finals against the Boston Celtics.
Lue gave more insight into his health issues and said when he returned for an April 5 home game against the Washington Wizards, it was too soon.
“I had some tough problems going on throughout the course of the season and I probably could have folded myself, but I wasn’t going to do that,” Lue said Friday. “I knew that even if I wasn’t feeling a hundred percent, I had to get back for the playoffs. That’s my time. That’s my moment. I didn’t want to put our coaches in that situation. I didn’t want to put our players in that situation, and I had to fight through it.
“That’s what champions do. I gave everything I had.”