James, Cavaliers’ experience will be too much

Brad Stevens deserves to be NBA Coach of the Year for guiding the Boston Celtics to a second-place finish in the East and for leading them past Milwaukee and Philadelphia in the first two rounds of the playoffs.

Somehow, Stevens has kept the Celtics winning despite losing forward Gordon Hayward to an ankle injury in the first half of the first quarter of the first game of the season in a game against the Cavaliers at The Q. The Celtics finished the regular season 9-6 after Kyrie Irving underwent season-ending knee surgery. They needed seven games to eliminate the Milwaukee Bucks and then needed only five games to knock out the Sixers — the new darlings of the NBA.

The Celtics feel-good story is about to end. The Cavaliers are going to write the final chapter, just as they did in the Eastern Conference finals last year when they ended Boston’s season in five games. It might take six games this time, but the result will be the same.

The biggest difference between the Cavaliers and Sixers, other than LeBron James, is the Cavs know what to do in pressure playoff situations. The Sixers are young, and it showed. The 76ers threw away Game 3 late in the fourth quarter by making silly turnovers on their home court. They led Game 5 in Boston and let it slip away.

Only four Cavaliers — James, Kevin Love, J.R. Smith and Tristan Thompson — remain from the championship team of just two years ago. That is a huge turnover for a team that made it to the NBA Finals last year. But the Cavs know how to respond to pressure. They showed it when they fought back to beat the Raptors in overtime in Game 1 and again when James hit the buzzer-beater in Game 3 against Toronto.

“We won in different ways Games 1 through 4, so just having that experience,” Love said. “LeBron mentioned the four guys that have been here from the 2016 team — that’s a lot of experience. Kyle (Korver), George Hill and just bringing along the other guys as well will be good for us. I think we have that to our advantage, maybe even a little bit more so than Boston so we just have to kind of bank on that, that that’s going to help us.”

The Celtics will undoubtedly try to rough up Love, James, Hill and Korver, but they can’t afford to risk serious foul trouble because Stevens has a short bench. Only seven Celtics have averaged more than 15 minutes a game in the playoffs. By contrast, 10 Cavaliers have averaged more than 15 minutes a game, led by James.

James leads the NBA in virtually every scoring category in the playoffs. He is averaging 34.3 points, 9.4 rebounds and 9 assists while playing 41.4 minutes a game.

He has had five days to recuperate since the sweep of the Raptors was completed on May 7.

The Celtics are expected to use a variety of defenders on James. Marcus Morris, Jaylen Brown and Al Horford will all take a run at him. James can get them in foul trouble driving to the hoop. He won’t get all the calls. When he doesn’t, he’ll look to the official in disbelief and then lope on down the floor to play defense. But he’ll get enough calls, and that will be a difference in the series.

James has been to the NBA Finals seven straight times — four with the Miami Heat and three with the Cavaliers.

He is playing better now than ever, despite being 33. The Celtics are not going to derail the Cavaliers train as long as James is the engineer.