When it comes to the Eastern Conference finals, the Cavaliers are anything but the favorites.
Or maybe they are.
"Underdog? Me?" Cavs star LeBron James asked. "I will never be an underdog. I think we have a great chance."
So underdogs? Maybe not. But the Cavaliers do have the lower seed of the two teams competing for the right to reach the NBA Finals. Their opponent, the Atlanta Hawks, are the No. 1 seed and own home-court advantage.
Game 1 of the series is scheduled for Wednesday at 8:30 p.m. EST.
Like all of the teams left in the playoffs, the Cavs and Hawks are far from considered "traditional powers." In fact, in the four seasons prior to this, the Cavs compiled the worst record in the entire league.
Meanwhile, the Hawks have been considered one of those "running-on-the-treadmill" teams for what feels like forever. They typically didn't get past the first round of the playoffs, they typically didn't land a high draft pick, they typically were just sort of there, living life in basketball no-man's land.
That all changed this season, when the Hawks passed, cut and played team basketball on their way to East's best record (60-22).
The result was their first trip to the conference finals since 1970. It's also their first trip to the East finals ever, as Atlanta (yes, Atlanta) was a member of the Western Conference back then.
Today, the Hawks play a style very similar to the defending champion San Antonio Spurs. Not a surprise, since Hawks coach Mike Budenholzer spent years in the Spurs organization.
Under Budenholzer, the Hawks are constantly on the lookout for the open man. They feel as if there is always a better shot, and they don't stop moving the ball until they find it. They are a tight-knight group that believes in playing basketball like it's described in the encyclopedia.
But has all this garnered the Hawks any respect? Not really. Not when their best players are far from household names. You pretty much have to be an NBA die-hard to know their starting five of Paul Millsap, Al Horford, Kyle Korver, Jeff Teague and DeMarre Carroll.
And the Hawks are just fine with all that.
"Like everyone says, I guess, we don't have a superstar or whatever," Teague said after the Hawks' eliminated Washington in the second round. "But we come up big in big moments every night."
Meanwhile, the Cavs were built with stars in their eyes -- and in uniform. But LeBron James, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Love didn't really materialize until the second half of the season. Now, Love is out, Irving is hurting (but will play) and James is relying on the likes of Tristan Thompson, J.R. Smith, Iman Shumpert and even Matthew Dellavedova to help carry the team.
But good things are still plenty doable, according to James.
"That's what we're here for," he said. "We're gonna play hard, we're gonna give ourselves a fighting chance."
Same goes for the Hawks. Despite owning home-court advantage, they understand not many people actually consider them the favorites, either.
"We're about playing our style of basketball, whether it's preseason, regular season, postseason," Millsap said. "We're going to continue to play our style. We know who we are. We're not going to let everybody else tell us what we're not."
East Finals Schedule (all games 8:30 ET)
Game 1: Wed., May 20, Cleveland at Atlanta
Game 2: Fri., May 22, Cleveland at Atlanta
Game 3: Sun., May 24, Atlanta at Cleveland
Game 4: Tue., May 26, Atlanta at Cleveland
*Game 5: Thurs., May 28, Cleveland at Atlanta
*Game 6: Sat., May 30, Atlanta at Cleveland
*Game 7: Mon., June 1, Cleveland at Atlanta
