Cavaliers-Pistons: The key questions entering pivotal Game 5 that will decide the winner of the series

I often find myself in two frames of mind when preparing for and ultimately analyzing a second-round series.

I obviously want to see what the matchups looked like during the regular season, for whatever I can glean from those games. Beyond that, I’m also fascinated by what lessons may have been learned — or what ideas could be copied and better executed — based on what happened in their first-round series.

That was my starting point for Cavs-Pistons; both teams poked at each other in specific ways during their regular-season meetings, but they also had to grind through some gnarly first-round battles against the Raptors and Magic, respectively. In particular, the Cavs and Pistons had to find some answers to unlock their offenses in light of what those teams were doing to take things away.

Sure enough, we have a 2-2 series because they’ve taken turns dictating things defensively and forcing a bunch of turnovers to boot.

The Pistons have been physical on the perimeter and, at times, have made the paint a no-fly zone due to their cast of paint protectors. The Cavaliers, especially across Games 3 and 4, have ramped up their aggression (more on that shortly) to the point where the Pistons are facing some familiar questions from the regular season.

As we enter the final sprint of this series, we’ll once again examine the subplots that will ultimately decide the winner.

Let’s dig in, shall we?

Can the Cade Cunningham-Jalen Duren pick-and-roll get back on track?

There have been broader questions surrounding the Pistons’ half-court offense — I’ve asked a few myself — but the one action you could bank on, generally speaking, was the pick-and-roll involving Cade Cunningham and Jalen Duren.

Only the Jamal Murray-Nikola Jokić pairing (894) ran more ball screens during the regular season than Cade-Duren (879), and only that pairing (886) and the Luka Dončić-Deandre Ayton connection (852) produced more points on those possessions than Cade-Duren (766).

Between Cunningham’s blend of three-level scoring and playmaking chops, and Duren’s violent rolls and budding short-roll chops, teams largely haven’t had much fun dealing with them this season.

I say “largely” because the Pistons haven’t been able to consistently hit the same notes during the postseason.

The Magic, with their mix of collective size, willingness to switch, and intention to send a third defender to “tag” Duren on his rolls, were able to limit the impact of that pairing for large stretches of their first-round series.

One of the louder subplots of this series has been Duren once again struggling to assert himself offensively. A lot of that has been the Cavaliers, especially over the last two games, working to take the Cade-Duren two-man game off the table.

Here’s the game-by-game breakdown, courtesy of Second Spectrum:

• Game 1: 14 picks, 1.58 PPP

• Game 2: 15 picks, 0.86 PPP

• Game 3: 14 picks, 0.58 PPP

• Game 4: 9 picks, 0.75 PPP

The Cavs have opted to ramp up their aggressiveness against Cunningham, increasingly asking their bigs (Jarrett Allen, Evan Mobley) to get to the level of screens and hedge against Cunningham. When you combine that aggression at the point of screens with high tags on Duren, or Mobley simply roaming off of Ausar Thompson, you get some rough possessions on film.

Duren in particular has felt scattershot. He has oscillated between being too aggressive and missing obvious passing reads, and slowing up to process the floor to the point where Cleveland’s been able to recover — a death knell when facing an inherently rotation-based scheme.