What a day to come back from vacation. We’ve got a Game 7 to talk about before quickly shifting our attention to the conference finals. The Boston-Washington series played out pretty much as expected, but could anyone have guessed whom the hero of Game 7 would have been?

It wasn’t Isaiah Thomas or Al Horford. Bradley Beal’s best effort couldn’t save the Wizards. John Wall went ice cold in the fourth quarter after his heroics in Game 6. The hero of last night’s Game 7 was Boston’s Kelly Olynyk, much to the dismay of Kelly Oubre Jr.

Yes folks, you are read that correctly, the king of the man bun looked virtually unstoppable last night down the stretch. Olynyk scored a whopping 14 of his 26 points in the fourth quarter to keep the Wizards at bay and send Boston into the Eastern Conference Finals for the first time since 2012. This is one of those games where you just shrug your shoulders and say, “go figure.”

We didn’t get anything resembling the Wall-Thomas winner-take-all duel that anyone expected to happen last night. Instead, Boston fans got a folk hero moment that will be remembered by the die-hard fans for years to come. Now reality will set in tomorrow night when the Cavaliers come into Beantown for Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals. This brings us to the previews of the conference finals.

Eastern Conference Finals: Boston vs. Cleveland

Why not start here since we are already talking about it. It’s taken five years and a rebuild for the Celtics to get back to this point in the playoffs. Unfortunately the only thing that hasn’t changed since then is that LeBron James awaits them. While most people aren’t giving Boston much of a chance, don’t totally sleep on them. Home court advantage for the Celtics is a nice ace in the hole if they are able to prove the experts wrong a make it a series.

Boston enjoyed one of the best home court advantages this season, and in the last series had an offensive efficiency number that would have ranked as the best in the NBA. It won’t be the easiest task to win multiple games at TD Garden for the Cavaliers. There are a couple problems for those who believe that Boston can upset the Cavaliers though.

The first problem is the matchup in general. Boston lacks the star power Cleveland enjoys, which will lead to issues on both ends of the floor. Isaiah Thomas has been incredible this season, but will that continue when facing a combination of Kyrie Irving and Iman Shumpert? Maybe for a game or two, however that won’t be enough to win the series.

Another area where Boston will have matchup issues in in the frontcourt, specifically on the boards. The Celtics are not the greatest rebounding team in the league. In fact, they ranked near the bottom of the league for much of the season. That is going to be a serious problem because Cleveland has one of the best rebounders in the NBA and his name isn’t LeBron James. Tristan Thompson will be one of the x-factors in the series because of how dominant he can be rebounding the basketball. Thompson has actually been one of the best players for Cleveland against Boston this season.

The other problem with the notion that Boston will upset Cleveland a best of seven is the rest factor. While a lot has been made about the potential negative effect of rest on the Cavaliers, there is no doubt that is just conjecture in this case. Cleveland is potentially the most dangerous team in the league with legitimate rest.

Look at how the Cavaliers performed in the first round as compared to the second round. Ignore the fact that each series resulted in a sweep for a moment. Cleveland had its struggles in putting away Indiana in the first round, but then dominated Toronto in the second round. You can make the argument that Cleveland wasn’t as fresh against Indiana as they were against Toronto. It helps the team, but more specifically it helps LeBron James more than anyone on that roster.

James led the NBA in minutes per game despite resting eight games over the course of the regular season. While everyone made a commotion about the amount of minutes he had to play, you knew that James would be playing even more during the playoffs. James went from averaging 37.8 minutes per game in the regular season to a ridiculous 42.4 minutes per game in the postseason. Any rest that James can get at this point in the season gives the Cavs even more of an edge.

Winner: Cleveland in 5

 Western Conference Finals: Golden State vs. San Antonio

 

While most people want Cleveland-Golden State III in the finals, the second most-wanted series was this matchup between Golden State-San Antonio. They have not played each other in the postseason since the 2012-13 season, which was the birth of the “Splash Brothers.”

The season series between these two felt like a game of cat and mouse at times. San Antonio dominated on opening night, the second game four months later became a rest game for both teams, and the final regular season meeting was dominated by Golden State. Finally though, we get the matchup of the two best teams in the Western Conference.

Game 1 was a doozy between the injury to Kawhi Leonard, the post-game controversy over said-injury, and the comeback by Golden State to steal the game. However, there is a good chance that may have been the best game we’ll see in this round because of the Leonard injury.

Before exiting the game on Sunday afternoon, Leonard was by and large the best player on the court. He scored 26 points in 23 minutes, while compiling a plus/minus rating of +21. This is due in large part to his defensive presence against Kevin Durant and his ability to dictate tempo on the offensive end. Unfortunately, Leonard will be out for tonight’s Game 2.

Without Leonard, San Antonio has a tough task on its hands trying to avoid falling behind 2-0 in this series. Before I continue I’ll give you the opportunity to say, “but San Antonio beat Houston by 39 without Kawhi.” Yes, that did happen, but Golden State is not Houston despite the similarities in their styles.

Houston was solely reliant on James Harden to make plays with the basketball, so there was a way to shut down the Houston offense. Golden State does not rely on one player to initiate the offense and create shots. Steph Curry may be the point guard, but Durant and Draymond Green bring up the ball just as much as he does. San Antonio can’t zero in on just one guy to shut down this offense, which is the most efficient offense in the NBA.

However, just like rest will play a factor in the Cleveland-Boston series, the layoff between Game 2 and Game 3 could be the saving grace for San Antonio. It’s not completely out of the question that Leonard could return on Saturday for Game 3. Now he won’t be 100% but as we saw in Game 1, that is better than not having him on the court at all. Beating the Warriors in four out of five games is a tall order though.

Klay Thompson and Draymond Green will be much better offensively in this series. The Warriors won’t need to have Curry and Durant combine for 74 points every game. Tonight’s outcome will go a long way to deciding just how long this series will go.

Winner: Golden State in 6

 

That’s it for me today. I’ll be back tomorrow to break down the results of the NBA Draft Lottery on the Shooting the Moon Podcast. Follow me on Twitter @thereal_jmooney and go like the Shooting the Moon page on Facebook.