This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Basketball isn't just changing. It has changed.

Since somebody cut out the bottom of the peach basket, the 3-point shot and the application of simple math have altered everything as much as anything. And in the Warriors-Cavs NBA Finals series, everything is on the line — the 3-point line. This matchup will dramatically dial in on a bombs-away evolution that has rolled, in this case, into a revolution.

"The 3-point shot is so important and vital — to spread the floor, to give your best players as much room as possible, to get to the basket, to get to the free-throw line," Jeff Van Gundy said on Wednesday. "If you don't have shooting, it's really hard now to put together enough good possessions."

When the 3-point shot was first implemented in the NBA in 1979-80, it was seen as a bit of trickery, a laughable little gimmick, and for good reason: most players couldn't hit it. That initial year, there were 2.8 attempts put up per game, and 28 percent of them went in. That number climbed to 24.1 attempts this season, with better than 35 percent of them made. The perception about the shot's significance has rocketed upward with its usage.

Think about how coaching legends like Jerry Sloan and Pat Riley would have reacted to the kinds of shots Steph Curry and Klay Thompson take as a matter of routine now. Sloan, who favored a layup-first offense, likely would have screwed his body between the boards on the floor had any of his players thrown up those ridiculous heaves. He did say back then that he didn't so much mind guys taking 3-point shots, he said he minded them missing them. He did tolerate Jeff Hornacek and Mehmet Okur, but was probably haunted by three words: Benoit for 3. There's no definitive record of how Sloan felt about casual 28-footers.

More old-school thinking: Magic Johnson used to say, from the time he was a kid, playing on teams that had to win pickup games to stay on the court, that the side that shot the closest to the basket usually got the next run.

Not anymore.

Ask the Oklahoma City Thunder about that.

The Warriors, who sent the Thunder home by making a record 90 shots from beyond the arc in the Western Conference finals, have the rep as the team with the deep shooters. During their 73-win regular season, they launched 2,592 bombs and made 1,077. Curry and Thompson hit a combined total of 678.

In the last two games of the conference finals, Thompson, in Game 6, made a playoff-record 11 3-pointers. In the clincher, Curry dropped a Game 7-record seven 3s. All told, Golden State made 38 of 82 3-pointers in those decisive games. It is that easiest study of math, then — three is more than two — that preserved their season.

It's not quite as simple as this, but if a team makes around 50 percent of its 2-point shots, the 3-point equivalent would be 33 percent.

The Cavs seem to have learned that useful bit of arithmetic from the Warriors in last season's Finals defeat. More is better.

This time around, the Cavs, going into Thursday night's Game 1, had taken 465 3-pointers in the playoffs and made 43 percent of them. The Warriors in these playoffs, heading into Game 1, are making 40 percent. Cleveland's game plan appears to center around letting LeBron James work his wonders, while teammates J.R. Smith, who is making 46 percent from deep, Kyrie Irving, 46 percent, and Kevin Love, 45 percent, pop from around the arc.

"Golden State, particularly Curry, shoots so many 3s off the dribble," Van Gundy said. "I've never seen a guy shoot as well off the dribble with the range against the defensive pressure that Curry faces. It's incredible. It's revolutionary. I don't think that will take the game over, because he's the one guy who can shoot those shots, with the handle and the great shooting stroke.

"But 3-point shooting is always going to be forever more — unless they change the rules, move the line back — important now."

On account of that, he added that the defenses against the 3-point shot must improve moving forward because the rate of those shots and the players' modern efficiency isn't declining.

At least in a general sense, league-wide, the overall number of deep attempts has risen season by season, as has the number of makes. In 1990, for instance, 6.6 3-pointers per game went up, with 33 percent made. In 2000, there were 13.7 3-pointers taken and 35 percent made. Since then, the attempts have consistently increased, while the efficiency has hovered around 35 or 36 percent.

Some teams have mastered the skill better than others, and … well, here they are, the Warriors and Cavs fighting for a title.

Questions remain, such as who will hit those deep balls when the consequences are the greatest? Who will freeze or seize up and who won't? Other factors obviously come into play, small matters like defense and rebounding and pace of play. But, in the end, in a season and postseason of success built around long-range shooting, whoever does that best now will reap the ultimate reward.

GORDON MONSON hosts "The Big Show" with Spence Checketts weekdays from 3-7 p.m. on 97.5 FM and 1280 AM The Zone. Twitter: @GordonMonson.