Cavs confident they can improve after title: 'There's no ceilings'

Early in the 2015-16 regular season - when the Cleveland Cavaliers still looked out of sorts, bereft of identity, dour, and displeased with a coach who'd later be exiled - LeBron James bemoaned his team's lack of hunger, especially as it compared to that of the defending champion Golden State Warriors.

"We lost in the Finals. We didn't win. We lost," James said. "And the team that beat us looks hungrier than we are. It shouldn't be that way."

This season, following an insane, energizing run to a most improbable title over those Warriors, the Cavs are on the other side of the coin. They've been locked in, precise, playing selflessly, intuitively, joyously. Far from resting on their laurels, they've looked hungry for more, racing off to an 8-1 start and looking very much the part of the league's team to beat through the first three weeks of the season.

"There's no ceilings," head coach Tyronn Lue told The Vertical's Michael Lee. "With the talent that we have, and the shooters that we have, and the one-on-one players that we have, I think we can be great. The confidence of our team is very high. We know we can get better. Those guys know that, so it can be scary."

Lue's players echoed that sentiment.

"We have the motivation that we're the defending champs and we could have a chance to do it again," Kevin Love told Lee. "If everybody remains healthy, with this veteran type of team, we can make a run at it again. We think that's a very big deal. That's not lost on us. We’re setting the foundation now for the rest of the season, to play good basketball and not have any lapses."

For Love, James, and point guard Kyrie Irving, this is the culmination of a process that began in the summer of 2014. There have been plenty of twists and turns and bumps in the road. There've been detours and route changes and significant adjustments. There's been in-fighting and subtweeting. The ensemble has been retooled around them.

But, after starting the 2014-15 season 19-20, and firing David Blatt midway through last season, this iteration of the Cavs finally looks like the team many expected to see when they tethered these three stars together two years ago.

"It's just a trust factor," Irving said. "Things that we expect from each other, each and every game. Expectation level for us to play hard, it's very important. I don't want to harp on last year, but when you go through what we went through, it's kind of easy to go out there and execute a game plan, or stick to it. … We have each other's backs. We have the trust. We have a culture already built."

Even James, who's delivered so many searing critiques of his team throughout the past two regular seasons, likes where the Cavs are at.

"We're very focused. We're a determined team," he said. "Still motivated. Still motivated to continue to get better. We love playing the game of basketball with one another. It's fun for us. We want to continue to challenge each other on a day-to-day basis, and see how far our ceiling can go."

Maybe he missed Lue's memo. There are no ceilings, LeBron.