Cavs’ Koby Altman Strongly Suggests Core Will Return for Another Run

INDEPENDENCE, Ohio — It didn’t end like the Cavaliers hoped, but by golly, they sure had some fun along the way.

A 15-game winning streak to start the season. A 64-18 finish. The No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference. All in the first year under coach Kenny Atkinson.

Then things fell flat in the conference semifinals, with the Cavs being ousted by the Indiana Pacers in five games. 

President of basketball operations Koby Altman is focused on the good while not ignoring the bad. But the good was really good, and Altman suggested it’s still time to build — as opposed to, you know, gutting the roster.

“We’re not gonna go anywhere,” Altman said during his state-of-the-team address. “We’re gonna keep fighting for that championship. That window is wide open, we believe. … I love our foundation. I love our core.”

That said, Altman admitted the Cavs can’t just give their fans a regular season full of fun — and little else. 

“We have to figure out the next 16 (wins in the playoffs),” he said. “We have to get over that hump.”

He went on to say that the Cavs have to get “mentally tougher,” repeating that phrase over and over, making a point to drive it home. But oftentimes, you have to go through some pain to get to the other side.

And Altman is still hurting, he said. So much so that he’s found it difficult to watch the rest of the playoffs. Yet he is managing to keep things in perspective.

“I think we can all agree that coming into the season, no one predicted 64 wins,” he said. “In a lot of ways, we exceeded expectations. Because of that, we were expected to (reach the NBA Finals). We want to live in that space, but that expectation is new.”

He pointed to the Cavs’ core as still being relatively young. Evan Mobley is 23, Darius Garland is 25. Jarrett Allen is 27, and Donovan Mitchell, at 28, is still in his prime.

Altman added that the Cavs aren’t the only team to have raised expectations sky high … and then failed to finish the job.

Same thing happened to the Oklahoma City Thunder last year, when they landed the top seed in the West, only to be bounced in the second round. It took the Boston Celtics seven years to burst through the championship door with Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown as the centerpieces, and the Denver Nuggets eight years with Nikola Jokic, Jamal Murray and others.

Yes, the Cavs are hurting. No, panic has not set in.

“We’ve become very good at the regular season,” Altman said. “For 82 games, we’ve been brilliant. Now that next step is we have to figure out how to win at the highest level.”

Honestly? That’s actually not a terrible place to be.

“I’d rather be where we are now, trying to figure it out,” Altman said. “This is where we want to live — expectation of a championship. We don’t want to live where we were 3-4 years ago, where it was about ping-pong balls (in the draft lottery).”

Along with all that, Altman thwarted all those trade rumors that constantly seem to surround Allen and Garland.

“Jarrett Allen remains incredibly important to us,” he said. “Think about (Indiana center) Myles Turner. He’s always in trade rumors. And now Myles Turner is an intricate part of what the Pacers are doing. He’s an incredible example of sticking with a guy, and now he’s a huge part of their success.”

Then there’s Garland. Altman offered strong praise there, too.

“We can dispel the notion that Darius and Donovan can’t play together,” he said. “I do think there’s a level Darius can get to that he hasn’t tapped into yet. His next step is going to be, ‘How do I get stronger?’ There’s a level he has to get to from a body standpoint, and that’s on all of us.”

So despite some cries to blow it up, and the pain of a second-round elimination, Altman suggested the plan is to try to keep a good thing going — and get it to the point where it’s a great thing.

“We have the belief from the top down,” he said. “So that makes it easy.”