Lue’s return to help Cavs’ mission

Cavaliers coach expected to return to bench April 5 against the Wizards

The Cavaliers are peaking at the right time, it is fair to say, and now the captain of the ship is returning to the helm.

Tyronn Lue, who stepped aside for health reasons on March 19, will be back on the bench as head coach on April 5 when the Cavs host the Washington Wizards. The Cavaliers were 8-1 in his absence under acting coach Larry Drew.

Drew, a humble man, well-respected by the players, minimized his role in the Cavaliers’ recent run of success.

“I’m an extension of Ty,” Drew said on April 3 before the Cavs beat the Toronto Raptors, 112-106. “What he has set out as far as the foundation, it was my job to make sure we carried on. That’s all I’ve tried to do. I’ve tried to be that voice in his place and the guys have just responded.”

It has been a roller-coaster season for the Cavaliers, to say the least, starting just after the 2017 NBA Finals when Kyrie Irving said he wanted to be traded.

This team isn’t as good as the one that faced the Golden State Warriors in the Finals last year, yet it has overcome more issues than in the past three seasons combined to get to this point of the season. They are tied for third with the 76ers in the East heading into their game with the Wizards. The Cavs play in Philadelphia the next night.

Which team is the one to beat in the East? Despite being behind Toronto and Boston in the East standings, from here it looks like the Cavaliers are poised to defend their conference championship, which is what Lue has said all along.

Lue was stoic when the Cavaliers struggled from mid-December through the first week of February. Looking back, those struggles must have been chewing up the 40-year-old coach inside for him to get to the point where he had to take medical leave because of chest pains and a lack of sleep.

Lue did his best to hold the team together when Isaiah Thomas was going through his rehab from a May 2017 hip injury when Thomas was with the Celtics. Then he held the team from fracturing when Thomas was sabotaging team chemistry. Then he helped navigate the four new players acquired in a flurry of draft deadline trades — Larry Nance, Jr., Jordan Clarkson, George Hill and Rodney Hood — while Kevin Love recovered from a hand injury.

Ironically, Love returned the very day Lue stepped aside.

All this followed Lue’s task of blending Jeff Green, Jose Calderon, Cedi Osman, Ante Zizic and (since traded) Jae Crowder into the team that went to the Finals last year.

“They’ve shown they can overcome any adversity through the course of a game,” Drew said, referring to the Cavaliers players. “They can persevere. We’ve shown that all year through everything that’s happened to this ball club.

“What we’ve had to endure this entire season hasn’t been easy, but here we are in a great position, and that says a lot about our team.”

It says a lot about Lue and the coaching staff, too. And work remains to get Lance, Clarkson

and the other new players ready for the playoff run. Lance and Clarkson have never experienced the pressure of the NBA playoffs.

“They’re still new to the job,” Drew said. “They’re still trying to get an understanding of what we want. We’re still trying to find ways to best use them in what we do.

“We feel we have a lot of different weapons, now. We’ve gotten younger, faster and more athletic, but we’re still teaching these new guys.”

The heat is about to be kicked up a notch. It is good for the Cavaliers to have Lue healthy again, and reassuring to have him back in control.

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE Cavaliers head coach Tyronn Lue has been out since March 19 while he addressed health concerns.