CLEVELAND — The Cleveland Charge continued their impressive season on Friday as they cruised to an easy 125-99 win over the shorthanded Windy City Bulls thanks to standout performances from Riley Minix and Tristan Enaruna. The victory pulls the Charge within a half game of the top spot in the conference.
G League success is defined in two ways. Are you winning? And are your players being called up? The Charge have checked both boxes, which is incredibly difficult to do because that means you need
to be continually replacing the players who were just called up.
“It means that we have an incredible group, an incredible organization, and a staff that just continues to pour into these guys,” Charge head coach Eli Kell-Abrams said. “I just could not be prouder of the group we have. It’s really hard to lose the guys you lose and maintain your culture.”
One of the culture pieces they lost was Norchad Omier, who recently signed a two-way deal with the Los Angeles Clippers. This left a hole inside, which is why they targeted Olivier Sarr to fill that role. The Cleveland Cavaliers signed him to a two-way deal, and he made his debut with the Charge on Friday.
Kell-Abrams said he was proud of the way Sarr fought through adversity in his first game with the team. Sarr picked up two fouls in the first minute of the second half, which forced him to sit out the rest of the third quarter. He made up for lost time by pouring in 14 of his 18 points in the final quarter to help the Charge extend their 10-point lead at the beginning of the quarter into the 26-point blowout it became.
“He offers a level of rim protection that’s unprecedented in the G, and it’s something we’re going to rely on,” Kell-Abrams said after Sarr picked up a block and two steals to go along with his all-around good debut, albeit in just 21 minutes of play.
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Minix is another player the Charge added midway through the season, who has allowed them to keep momentum going. The Cavs signed him to a two-way deal in the middle of February. He once again made an impact with his outside shot, going 4-8 from three in his 22-point performance.
Despite how well the on-court results have been for Minix since coming to Cleveland — he came into this game averaging 19.9 points and 7.1 rebounds on .549/.461/.774 shooting splits — how he’s fit into the overall team structure is what has impressed his head coach.
“With his skill level, he could have come in and just been about his shots, been about his minutes, been about whatever he needed to do to get to the next level,” Kell-Abrams said. “But he bought into the group, and he won the guys instantly.”
Friday’s win was also carried by two guys who’ve been here all season: Enaruna and Darius Brown II.
It’s easy to talk yourself into Enaruna making an impact at the next level sooner rather than later. He’s a 6’7” wing who can attack off-the-dribble, has good lateral quickness, and most importantly has a great feel for the game.
There’s always room on an NBA court for people who have that skill. Especially one who has improved his outside shot as much as Enaruna has.
Confidence in the outside shot has been an issue with Enaruna, but that’s turning around. He shot 28.6% from three during the first 14 games of the Tip-Off Tournament, but is connecting on 47.9% of his threes since the regular season began around the start of the new year.
Enaruna attributes the improvement to having more confidence in his shot.
“Basketball is very statistics-based,” Enaruna said.
That got into his head to the point that he would worry about misses so much that it affected how he reacted when he got the ball open on the perimeter.
“I could feel my body tense up because I wanted to make it so bad,” Enaruna said. The solution was coming to a better understanding that you aren’t defined by one shot and trusting the work that you put in.
“I’ve shot thousands of threes,” Enaruna said. “I know how to make them. You just got to trust your body to do that.”
That worked on Friday, as Enaruna went 3-7 from deep en route to a 25-point, 11-rebound, and two-assist night.
Brown once again contributed 15 or more assists for the fifth time this season as he collected 18 in the victory.
“He drives it all,” Kell-Abram said of Brown. “When you have guys that are not about themselves, that are past first in a league that is not a pass-first league, that makes us different than everybody else.”
This Charge team has been different all season. They are within striking distance of the first spot in the conference and have a deep enough team to make a run in the postseason. And that’s because this group has been built on the right things and has completely bought into each other’s success.
“It starts with the foundation,” Enaruna said. “The coaching staff putting a plan together before the season about how we’re going to do things right, no matter who we got on our squad. Whether guys are going up and down, we have this system that works, and everybody just buys in. It works for everybody.”
