INDEPENDENCE, Ohio — Cavs president of basketball operations Koby Altman spoke with a mixture of pride, disappointment and urgency for a little more than 30 minutes Friday morning, recapping a tumultuous season that ended with a four-game sweep by the New York Knicks in the Eastern Conference finals.

The team now turns to a pivotal summer, with plenty of franchise-altering decisions to make.

“Everybody is aligned in where we want to get to,“ Altman said. ”We all know we need to dig deep to take that next step. I always say two things can be true. We hated the way it ended. We were disappointed with the way it ended. I think the reason for that is we have higher expectations. We’ve built this thing to a level of standards, of excellence, and we know we could be better, but the other thing that could be true is we could be proud of what we’ve accomplished here and be proud of what we’ve built.

“We believe in the culture that we built. We believe in the players that we have in house. It’s been a long road to get here. It’s been five years of sustained success, and we’re still doing this [gradually improving], but we have to figure out how we break through it one more time, and that’s going to be the most difficult step.”

After those opening remarks, Altman fielded questions about the state of the team, including Donovan Mitchell’s impending contract extension, James Harden’s future, why there wasn’t any thought given to a coaching change and those incessant rumors about trading for Milwaukee Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo.

Here’s what Altman said:

Does the next step require external moves, or can it happen internally?

“I think first we look internally. I think that there’s still growth to be had. And once you get to this level, it kind of gives you another perspective of how hard this thing is. We still have young players on the roster. We still have Evan Mobley that’s 24 years old. This group is still kind of new when you talk about adding James Harden at the deadline. We’re hopeful to have him back next year and have a full summer with him and training camp with him. But we’ve also always looked externally as well.

“Over the last five years, we’ve retooled this roster, added to this roster. We’ve looked internally. We’ve grown internally. We’re operating at a position of real strength in terms of our foundation. And I think those discussions happen now. Do we have enough? Do we add around the edges? This is certainly not a place where we’re like, ‘We need to blow this up and start again.’ That’s certainly not where we’re at. But those discussions will happen. But certainly, internally right now, there’s more that we have that we can get to.”

What is Harden’s future with the organization?

“Well, James is interesting. Obviously, he has a player option. We have to talk to his representation about what that looks like. We’re hopeful he comes back and we have a full training camp with him. He was remarkable for us. I think people need to take a step back and realize we didn’t trade for MVP James Harden. We traded for James Harden at the end of his career that has transformed himself to becoming one of the best point guards in the league. He helped stabilize us. He helped re-galvanize the group. We were kind of shaky there, in terms of our belief, and when he came on board, he gave us a real belief and swagger. We’re not in the conference finals without James. That’s a real important piece. But we need to figure it out. Obviously, we’re in the second apron as of right now, and we need to figure out what pieces we can bring back. Those are hard decisions. The CBA puts that [on you]. If you have a really good deep roster, you have to make difficult decisions. We’ll start to deliberate what that means and who we can bring back.”

Will Cavs offer Mitchell a lucrative contract extension on July 7? Are they comfortable if he waits until free agency?

“Understand the question. All I can tell you is Donovan has been steadfast in how much he loves it here. There hasn’t been any question of will he be here and does he want to be here? I think that’s the biggest thing, right? That’s the best thing, right? When we have a superstar of his caliber that wants to be in Cleveland, that’s our best ambassador, that’s our best recruiter. There’s guys that are here that wouldn’t be here without him, quite frankly, so I think the bigger question is the one that’s been answered. Does he want to be here and does he want to be here long term? I think he’s answered that.”

On the evaluation of Atkinson:

“I think we heard a lot of noise after that loss to the Knicks, which was unfortunate. I don’t think it was a story. There was never a conversation about Kenny at all. When we win as an organization, we win as an organization. When we lose as an organization, we all own it, and there doesn’t always have to be a fall guy. Kenny has been remarkable the last two years. I mean, if you just zoom out and look at his resume, right? This year, we get better in terms of our playoff success, get to a conference finals, 52 wins. I think that the most extraordinary part of Kenny this year was, out of the gate, we were hurt and beat up and a lot of starters missing from the start of the season. And we go 17-16. For him to stabilize that with 41 different starting lineups, I think was incredible and to get us back to 52 wins, he’s able to move and adjust on the fly really, really well. We trade for James Harden, add a couple pieces, obviously in Dennis and Keon at the deadline, and now we have to shift and change the way we play a little bit, or dramatically in some cases. And he was able to adapt and make and mold and build around that. He’s done a remarkable job. And obviously … the player development, which we brought him in for to make sure we have a stable pipeline to continue our growth. I want that series back. But we have to own that as an organization. How can we get better? The players own it, too.

“This is not a Kenny discussion. It never was a Kenny discussion. It was an organizational discussion of how we can break through to that next level. I think if you’re looking at his resume in totality, the last two years have really been remarkable from a record standpoint, from a player development standpoint and obviously breaking through to a conference finals is a real achievement for a head coach and for us.”

Can Mitchell be the centerpiece of a team that wins a championship?

“I would say that Donovan is uniquely ours, and he’s our guy. When you are constantly an All-NBA talent that is a great leader, that has incredible work ethic, that adds to the culture, that adds to the mystique of our program, you embrace that. And it’s easy to point to other players and say, ‘Oh, I wish I had …’ no, Donovan is uniquely ours and we’re very, very fortunate to have an All-Star, superstar-caliber player that’s here in Cleveland, that loves it here. So let’s lean into him, with his faults. They all have faults. They all have warts. If I went and got another player and brought him here, we’d be pointing and poking and prodding because we’ve seen so much, we’re in the weeds so much, but he has tremendous respect of his peers and tremendous respect internally. He’s broken through to a conference finals, his first in nine years, and he wants more. No one was more disappointed in our exits than he was. He has high, high expectations.

“Do we think we can win with him as the best player on a championship team? Yes, and we’re going to keep pouring into that.”

On the level of urgency to get out of the second apron:

“The urgency is if there’s a move that makes sense to do it. There’s no urgency to get out of it just to get out of it because then you’d be shedding contracts and good players to do it. You don’t just do it to do it. We’ve been very, very strategic. This is the first year we’ve been in the tax since 2018. We got to be strategic on what we’re trying to do. Even in the second apron, we were able to navigate that trade deadline, shed some money, bring in three guys that helped us. It’s not a death knell because you’re in the second apron. I’m pretty confident in our front office and our creativity. And you mentioned urgency, there’s absolute urgency, there always is. When you have Dan [Gilbert] as your owner and the Gilbert family that wants to bring another championship to Northeast Ohio, it’s great pressure. It’s not, hey, go save money or shave this or get out of — no, it’s like, how do we get better? That’s the question. If that’s the North star, you’re not worried about the second apron. You’re not worried about the tax bill. It’s, how do you break through? And so we’re in great shape because we’re aligned under that guise and there’s no mandate to do this or do that. How do we get better? And getting better means making the Finals and that’s a hard, hard thing to do. That’s incremental. That could be around the edges. That could be a big ticket move. We’re going to look at all of it and certainly be able to navigate around sort of the confines of the second apron if we have to.”

Can you say for certain that Evan Mobley will be on the roster next season?

“Yeah. I mean, he’s part of our future. I don’t know what you mean by …”

What about all the Giannis rumors?

“We’re not going to speculate on any players outside these walls. All I can tell you is, since Evan’s been here, we’ve had the third best record in the league. For five years, third-best record in the league. Now we don’t have a championship to show for that yet, right? Boston and Denver, the other two ahead of us, they have a championship to show for that. But all Evan has done is impacted winning. He’s been remarkable for us in terms of our ascent the last five years. He’s a huge part of what we do. He knows he needs to get better. When we sat down and talked to him, we talked about the intangible stuff. Not even the skill set stuff. How are we going to get stronger? How are we going to build your body up so you’re going to be able to sustain? We played him a lot of minutes this postseason. We are very fortunate to have drafted Evan Mobley in a spectacular rookie class. You think about that rookie class, right? Cade Cunningham, right? MVP candidate. Scottie Barnes, who has emerged to be one of the best players in the NBA. We saw that for seven games. That was not fun. Franz Wagner. Evan Mobley. That’s a spectacular class, and out of those guys, who’s the first to the conference finals? Evan Mobley. So we have to be proud of that. It’s easy to knock someone down. We’re in the weeds. We can point to this, we can point to that. He’s a franchise-caliber player, and we’re very fortunate to have him.”