NBA Finals 2017: Power ranking Finals MVP possibilities
By Luke Norris
Kevin Love
2017 NBA Playoffs: 17.2 points, 10.4 rebounds, 1.9 assists
Kevin Love is heating up. After struggling a bit in the Cavaliers’ second-round series against the Toronto Raptors, a series in which he averaged just 12 points and didn’t shoot the ball particularly well, Love turned it on in the Eastern Conference Finals against the Celtics. Starting in Game 1, he scored 32 points, including a 6-for-9 performance from the 3-point line at TD Garden.
Love continued to play well throughout the series and although he never exceeded his point total from the series opener, he averaged 22.6 points and 12.4 rebounds over the five games with Boston and is looking to ride that momentum into the NBA Finals. Outside of a few rough nights, he’s been shooting the ball very well in the postseason. In 13 games, he’s gone 69-for-151 from the floor (45.7 percent) and 38-for-80 from beyond the arc (47.5 percent). He’s also grabbing more than 10 boards per contest and grabbed four steals in the Game 5 clincher in Boston.
With LeBron James and Kyrie Irving as teammates, the chance of Kevin Love winning Finals MVP is very low but he’s going to be a very important part of this series. The Golden State defense is going to be swarming LeBron James at every turn — at least they’ll be trying to do that — and Love is going to have to knock down the open opportunities he’s given.
In the two games against the Warriors this season, Love averaged just 11.5 points but that’s a little misleading. He scored 20 points in the Christmas Day game but left the second game early due to back soreness, not that it would have really mattered as the Cavs were down 29 at the half that day. He’ll certainly look to be better than he was a year ago. Love averaged just 7.3 points in last year’s Finals.