Can Cleveland Cavaliers Survive Kevin Love's Shoulder Injury?

The Cleveland Cavaliers are advancing to the second round of the playoffs for the first time in five years, but like Kevin Love's shoulder, the Cavs will need to put their celebration on ice. 

In a 101-93 Game 4 victory that resembled a heavyweight prize fight, frustration from both sides manifested itself in the form of excessive physicality. That was bad news for Love, who suffered a nasty left shoulder injury in the first quarter and did not return. (Warning: Video may be disturbing for some viewers.)

According to Chris Haynes of Northeast Ohio Media Group, Love was officially diagnosed with a dislocated left shoulder and was not pleased with Boston Celtics forward Kelly Olynyk: 

ESPN.com's Brian Windhorst added that Love may be out into May: 

"I thought it was a bush-league play," Love told reporters after the game, according to ESPN.com's Dave McMenamin. "I have no doubt in my mind that he did it on purpose." 

While the Cavaliers hold their breath and hope for the best regarding an official recovery timetable, head coach David Blatt needs to prepare for life without Love as a second-round showdown with the Chicago Bulls hovers on the horizon. 

And it won't be easy. 

Love is an indispensable component of Cleveland's three-pronged attack, and the Cavaliers offense has been substantially better with him on the floor in the postseason, just as it was during the regular season, according to ESPN Stats & Info: 

LeBron James—who tallied 27 points, 10 rebounds and eight assists in Sunday's closeout victory—discussed Love's profound impact following Thursday's 103-95 Game 3 win, according to Cameron Moon of Northeast Ohio Media Group: 

"

He's played an unbelievable series. He missed some shots in Game 1, but his impact on the floor, to make shots, and rebound. He's been highly criticized and I know why. I think when you have your own team and then you come together with a Big Three, they have to find someone. Chris Bosh was that guy at some point in Miami. Kev was the guy they tried to find and tear down. I don't get too involved in what everybody says. I think he's relished the chance to be part of this franchise. He's definitely used that as motivation, I believe. He's a very cerebral basketball player. For us to be the team we want long-term, we need Kevin to be Kevin.

"

As we await word on how long Love is sidelined, Blatt will need to ponder lineup permutations that put his team in a position to best mask Love's absence. 

Replacing his skill set is an impossibility, to be sure. He was the only qualified player to average at least 16 points and nine rebounds while shooting better than 35 percent from three this season, and the Cavaliers are devoid of other stretch bigs who can replicate his production.

As Bleacher Report's Ethan Skolnick noted, Love's absence wasn't kind to the Cavaliers' floor balance earlier in the season, and that will remain a cause for concern against a disciplined Bulls defense: 

That's a problem, namely because everything Cleveland does on offense is predicated on proper spacing.

To wit: In the Cavs' 113-98 loss to the Bulls on Feb. 12 sans Love, Cleveland shot 43.5 percent from the field and 25.8 percent from three despite launching 31 long-range attempts. 

Situating Love in the corners or on the wing draws bigger defenders away from the rim and affords James and Kyrie Irving with cleaner driving lanes. Take the seven-year veteran out of the equation, and the paint can get packed in a hurry. 

If Love is sidelined for a prolonged period of time, Blatt will be left with decisions to make. They are strategic choices LeBron is all too familiar with after Erik Spoelstra had to tinker with the Miami Heat's lineups once Chris Bosh went down with an abdominal injury during their second-round series against the Indiana Pacers in 2012.

Skolnick recalled:  

But there are pros and cons accompanying each potential adjustment. 

The first modification that comes to mind is shifting LeBron up to the 4. Doing so would allow another wing or guard (read: Iman Shumpert or Matthew Dellavedova) to space the floor and pull a big away from rim-protecting duties. 

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James even recorded a player efficiency rating of 32.9 while playing power forward this season, according to 82games.com, but he only occupied that spot for 4 percent of Cleveland's total minutes. He also knows how to thrive in that spot, having played 87 percent of his minutes at the 4 during the 2014 postseason and 92 percent of his minutes there en route to capturing a second straight title in 2013. 

The drawback involves size. As the Heat learned, opening up space for James to operate to involves sacrificing rebounding opportunities in the name of added perimeter looks.

Which brings us to the second alteration Blatt can make.  

If rebounding remains a priority—and it very well may against a stout Bulls front line that touts Joakim Noah, Pau Gasol and Taj Gibson—James can continue playing the 3 while Tristan Thompson and Timofey Mozgov hold down the 4 and 5, respectively. 

In fact, the five-man unit of Irving, J.R. Smith, James, Thompson and Mozgov was the only Cavaliers lineup not featuring Love to log at least 70 minutes this season. However, the results in a 75-minute sample were hardly encouraging. With that group on the floor, opponents outscored the Cavaliers by 8.8 points per 100 possessions, posting offensive and defensive ratings of 105.7 and 114.5, respectively.

Evidently, there's no clear-cut solution. The Cavaliers will need to embrace trial by fire to try to weed out the negatives and accentuate the positives as LeBron attempts to teach his teammates about dealing with postseason adversity. 

Survival will ultimately require an on-the-fly education in discipline and modified role acceptance, and it's on the young Cavaliers to prove their postseason mettle by making seamless adjustments in order to mitigate the negative effects of Love's ill-timed injury.   

All statistics are current as of April 26 and courtesy of Basketball-Reference.com and NBA.com unless otherwise noted.