CLEVELAND, Ohio — The Cavs picked a bad night to have their worst performance of the season from 3.

In Game 1 of the Eastern Conference semifinals, the Pacers made them pay for it.

Cleveland made just nine of 38 attempts from deep on Sunday night in a 121-112 loss. It‘s the fewest number of total 3s Cleveland has made in a game this season, and the 23.7% mark is the second-worst of the year.

“We missed good looks,” Donovan Mitchell said. “We missed a lot of good looks. And then when you miss shots, that’s when they get going in transition.”

Indeed, the Pacers bested the Cavs in transition, but barely — only a 15-14 advantage.

Really, Indiana did most of its damage from beyond the arc in its half-court offense.

For the game, the Pacers went 19 of 36 (52.8%) from 3. The total number of makes and that percentage are the Pacers’ fourth-best marks of the year when compared to their regular season numbers.

Andrew Nembhard led the way for Indiana, making five of six attempts, and Aaron Nesmith wasn’t far behind making four of six. Eight of the 11 Pacers who played Sunday night made at least one 3.

If you’re keeping track at home, that means the Pacers were a whopping plus-30 from deep. Put it in those terms, and it‘s a minor miracle the Cavs kept this loss as close as they did.

Yes, the Pacers shot lights out, but these numbers illustrate important notes about this series and about where the Cavs are right now.

No. 1, obviously the Cavs continue to miss Darius Garland‘s shot creation. Garland missed his third straight game with a sprained left big toe, and in his absence, Mitchell took 30 shots and Ty Jerome took 20.

Mitchell was 1 of 11 from 3, and Jerome was 1 of 4. Both players, but especially Mitchell, wound up with isolation looks early.

“I was 1-of-11 from 3 and some of them were wide open,” Mitchell said. “Some of the shots I‘ve made. The biggest thing is, when the shots aren’t falling, how do you respond? But when a team like this, they run like that, it makes it tough.”

Overall, the Cavs’ misses just seemed to be contagious. Cleveland looked like a team that had a nearly week-long layoff, after sweeping Miami last Monday in the first round.

While the numbers from deep were some of the worst of the year for the Cavs, they’re also something we’ve seen recently.

Which brings us to No. 2: The Cavs are a team that has a lot of its identity tied up into how they shoot from 3.

Their four worst regular-season performances from deep all came from March 11 onward: A March 23 win at Utah (22.9%); a March 11 win vs. Brooklyn (23.8%); a March 16 loss vs. Orlando (25%); and an April 6 loss to Sacramento (26.3%).

It‘s not a new problem, and typically, it‘s one the Cavs can solve when they lock down better on the defensive end, which brings us to No. 3: Their poor performance from 3 and their poor defensive performance is a chicken-or-egg scenario.

On Sunday, the Cavs were out of position, getting beat on pump fakes, and beat off the dribble. They allowed Indiana to have excellent ball movement, and the result was the Pacers assisting on 30 of their 44 makes for the game.

Of the 83 total shots the Pacers took, the Cavs contested only 30, according to NBA.com data. They contested just 14 of their 36 3-point shots.

The Pacers were better, but barely, contesting 16 of the Cavs’ 38 3-point attempts, and 35 of their 98 total shot attempts.

Essentially, Indiana was winning a game of HORSE easily.

So yes, while it was a bad night to have a bad night, there were tangible reasons for the Cavs to have this kind of clunky performance.

Getting Garland back would help. So would less isolation and more sharing on offense. Finally, some good old-fashioned locking down on defense could do wonders.

Welcome to the second round of the NBA playoffs.