The Next Lamb: The Cleveland Cavalieres

Game 17: Boston (12-4) at Cleveland (7-9)

Tuesday, November 30

7 p.m. Eastern

NBATV

Last meeting: @Cleveland 95, Boston 87 (10/27/10)

The last time the Celtics faced the Cavs, it was the night after the big opening win over Miami -- looking back, it doesn't seem so big, does it? -- and after Boston blew a double-digit second half lead, everyone was quick to blame the hangover from the night before.

Since that time, however, the Cavs have played a bit better than nearly everyone expected they would, emerging as a contender for a low playoff seed in the East. They play hard and are well-coached, and teams with those characteristics are tough to beat.

J.J. Hickson did the most damage to the Celtics in the earlier meeting, and he's again the guy to watch -- he's mobile, active, and has a good jumper. I mentioned last time that offensively, he reminded me a bit of Kevin Garnett, and that's the kind of player that can give Boston trouble if Garnett doesn't stay at home.

The ever-pesky Anderson Varejao mans the middle for the Cavs, and his mobility could give Shaquille O'Neal trouble. Varejao is the kind of player whose value you don't recognize until he goes off the floor and you realize how much easier everything is without him on it. As such, I'd like to see Boston try to ride Shaq's recent hot hand in the early going and maybe get Varejao in foul trouble.

Mo Williams is the starter at point guard. He didn't play in the first Boston game, and while he adds some scoring punch, he's missed five games this year and it's not at all clear that Cleveland suffers too much with him in street clothes. The other change in the lineup is that Joey Graham has recently replaced Jamario Moon in the starting lineup, which really matters very little in the grand scheme of things.

Cleveland's bench had a nice game the last time we played them. They've got some pretty good second-unit weapons, as second-unit weapons go. The most obvious is former All-Star Antawn Jamison, a versatile forward who we can hope decides to content himself with launching perimeter shots. Daniel Gibson is legitimate three-point sniper. I'm not a Ramon Sessions fan, but he has his moments; a big key to defending him is letting him take all the crazy shots he seems willing to take, rather than over-reacting to his penetration and leaving someone else open or by bailing him out with a foul call. None of those guys has a reputation for defense, however, and while the other two bench guys -- Ryan Hollins and Moon -- are decent on D, I think the Celtics bench could do some damage.

It's a game Boston should win, but to reiterate, they'll have to do more than just show up.

Cleveland 95, Boston 87

To paraphrase Dwyane Wade, apologies to anyone who thought we were going 82-0.

[recap] [box score]

For the first time since April, the Boston Celtics played a meaningless meaningful basketball game (meaningless in that it was against an opponent that doesn't figure to be in the title hunt, but meaningful in that the game counted, unlike preseason). And coming off the high of the opener against Miami the night before, this loss to the Cavs was a reminder of how frustrated a regular season basketball game can make yours truly.

In truth, I shouldn't be surprised, and I wasn't really. Coming off an intense game the night before, in Cleveland against a Cavaliers team eager to prove itself without LeBron James, it stands to reason that the Celtics might have a little bit of a letdown. And I expect us to struggle with back-to-backs early in the season, as everyone -- but particularly Jermaine O'Neal and Shaquille O'Neal -- finds his sea legs.

Still, this was frustrating. We had an 11-point lead in the third quarter, but were outscored 27-14 in the fourth.

Good bullets:

• Glen Davis and Marquis Daniels both played well off the bench for the second consecutive night. It is going to take some getting used to, but those guys seem to be becoming legitimate offensive options, guys you can isolate or throw it to in the post.
• Rajon Rondo had another superb game. Against Miami, he was primarily a distributor, racking up 17 assists. Against Cleveland, he still set the table with nine assists, but he looked for his own offense more, particularly early, and finished with 18 points.
• Kevin Garnett still looks healthy, though it's not showing up in his stat line. The one thing you can point to as a negative from KG are his turnovers; he had seven against the Heat and another three against the Cavs. Quite a few of those have been travels or plays where his brain doesn't seem to be moving at the same speed his body is. It's interesting, because last year, the thing about KG was that he had to learn how to play with the bad knee. Now, it seems like he has to re-learn how to play unhurt. He'll be fine.
• On one play in the third quarter, Rondo led the break and pitched it to KG trailing. Garnett was running at full speed and caught the ball in stride at the foul line. Aware of the defense sliding over and clogging his lane to the bucket, KG hit Rondo, who had continued to the rim, with a perfect give-and-go pass for an easy layup. Every other power forward in the history of the game goes to the rim in that spot and either travels, throws up a wild shot, or commits a charge -- and the point guard gets criticized for setting up his big man for failure. KG is a treasure.

Bad bullets:

• Boston commits its share of fouls, but one thing that has been key to their defensive success over the past three seasons is allowing the opposition to take difficult, contested shots. At least once tonight, Shaq committed a needless foul that bailed out the opposition. We know he's a liability defending the pick and roll, but he needs to realize that he's so massive that he can disrupt a shot without blocking it. The play I'm thinking of was when Anthony Parker came off a screen and drove across the lane to the basket. Shaq was right there, and Parker would have had to take a very difficult running shot over O'Neal. But Shaq bailed him out with the foul.
• Nate Robinson still looks like he's pressing a little bit. I noticed it mostly in the second quarter. I think a big part of why we're seeing Rondo play more with the second team (as opposed to Ray Allen or Paul Pierce) is to try to get Nate comfortable, at least until Delonte West comes back. Robinson was paired with Von Wafer in the second quarter, but made a positive contribution when sharing the backcourt with Rondo.
• Our end of quarter offense is still terrible. Against Miami, I think we had two bad possessions and one good one. Against Cleveland, we just had two bad ones. At the end of the first quarter, Rondo dribbled in place at the top of the key as the clock wound down, juking himself more than any Cleveland defender, trying to get a good rhythm to step into a jumper (which isn't his shot anyway). At the last second, he thought better of it and threw a shot pass to Davis, who actually drilled a three-pointer. Glen Davis from 23 feet is not what we want in that situation, first of all, and second of all, Rondo wasted so much time that after reviewing the play during the commercial break, the officials determined the shot had come after the horn and took the points off the board. At the end of the third quarter, Nate more or less walked the ball upcourt despite there being only four or so seconds left in the period. The only shot he could muster was a long, awkward three-pointer. We need to find something better at the end of periods, and our guys need to be more aware of the clock.
• We became, as we are wont to do, needlessly obsessed with the three-pointer late in the fourth quarter. Down 89-84 with 2:17 remaining, our next possession revolved around finding Ray Allen for a three-pointer, which he missed. After a stop on the other end, Boston was lucky that a loose ball found Davis, and Baby laid it just as the shot clock buzzer went off. Garnett rebounded a Parker miss with 1:04 remaining, and on the resulting possession, Allen missed another three. Boston got yet another stop, and this time Pierce missed a 15-foot jumper, after which Cleveland put the game away at the free throw line. This happens a lot; we get enough stops to come back and win games down the stretch, but we don't execute offensively and end up taking low percentage shots. Going for three too early is a lot like going for two too early in football; if you fail, you force yourself into going for it again.

Cavaliers bullets:

• The game was on NBA League Pass, and the feed was of the Cleveland broadcast. It was interesting, though perhaps not that surprising, to hear little mention of James -- who would obviously been the major storyline had the game been covered by a national, unbiased broadcast team. The franchise really seems to be rallying around James' departure; the team's slogan this year, judging by its intro video, is "All for One, One for All." Not a bad start.
• J.J. Hickson, Cleveland's young power forward, reminds me a bit of Garnett. He moves well and has a great stroke. He's several inches shorter than Garnett and therefore can't hit turnaround jumpers with quite as large a degree of difficulty as KG can, but he seems ready to become a real solid player. He also has some of KG's little tricks, like jumping the point guard after a made basket to slow the opposition down.
• Ramon Sessions, who started tonight in place of the injured Mo Williams, had 14 points, but he also had four turnovers and took a game-high 16 shots. The fourth-year guard out of Nevada really came onto everyone's radar screen at the end of his rookie season with the Bucks, when he closed the campaign with five consecutive double-digit assist games, including an incredible 24 dimes in a 151-135 loss to the Bulls. But he really hasn't lived up to that potential. I have it out for Sessions a little bit, because he backed up Jonny Flynn in Minnesota last year, and as Flynn struggled to learn a system that didn't fit him or his teammates particularly well, many were calling for Sessions to get more minutes. But Sessions' decision-making wasn't any better then than it was tonight against the Celtics. He goes up in the air too much without a plan, and plays very out of control. His turnover rate would be higher, but he often just flips the ball at the basket when he finds himself in trouble. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but he gets himself into that spot too often. I'm beginning to doubt he'll ever be more than a streaky role player.

Back at it on Friday against the Knicks. The free preview of League Pass will still be running then, so check your local cable schedule for the channel.

Boston 101, Milwaukee 89

I missed the first six-and-a-half minutes of this one, and while Boston was down 21-10 when I joined the broadcast (the first of the season for Tommy and Mike on League Pass!) and we didn't really blow this one open until the fourth quarter, it never really seemed like we were in trouble.

[recap] [box score]

-The second unit really changed the course of this one, as a 30-23 first-quarter deficit became a 55-47 halftime lead, with a lot of the work done against Milwaukee's starters. One thing that I really like about our bench is how well they get to the line. Leon Powe and Tony Allen combined to shoot 14 free throws, and while Powe had an off-night from the stripe -- he made just four of nine attempts tonight -- getting those freebies makes up for whatever limitations the two might have offensively.

-Kendrick Perkins tonight showed what close watchers of the Celtics have insisted on for a while, to much scoffing around the league: When he applies himself, Perk can be a serious defensive force. He had a career-high seven blocked shots tonight, and there was a stretch at the end of the first quarter where he disrupted three or four consecutive Milwaukee possessions. He lacks the consistency and the ability to stay out of foul trouble to be a truly elite post defender, and he may never get there, given that this is his sixth year in the league. Then again, he's only 23, so there's hope.

-Powe plays bigger guys pretty well, but we need to give him help when he's guarding guys like Andrew Bogut. Powe can play someone like Bogut perfectly and still give up buckets because Bogut is simply too tall for him.

-Milwaukee's point guards, Luke Ridnour and Ramon Sessions, were pretty awful tonight, combining for nine turnovers, many of which were live-ball and led to open-court layups. Tony Allen, Eddie House, and Rajon Rondo did a nice job shooting the gaps when those two tried to drive and kick, but the fact is that Ridnour and Sessions simply weren't drawing the defense before giving up the rock.

-House had 11 points of five-for-seven, but four of his buckets were layups in the open floor, several off the aforementioned turnovers. He still hasn't hit two jumpers in the same game this year.

-We got our first look of the season at Billy Sky. His first two touches were pretty big failures, as he drove recklessly into traffic, getting his shot blocked the first time and getting whistled for an offensive foul on the second occasion. Still, he hit a nice 15-footer from the right baseline, displaying good form and a much quicker release than I expected.

-Minute allocation for the Big Three was pretty good tonight, although Pierce still played 38 minutes as he continued his work with the second team. But Ray Allen played 31 minutes, Kevin Garnett only 30, and all three were on the bench with four minutes to go.

Next game is Sunday night at 6 p.m. Eastern in Detroit, which kicks off a ridiculous five-games-in-seven-days stretch where we face three likely Eastern conference playoff teams -- Detroit, Toronto, and Atlanta -- by Wednesday. I had planned on doing some scouting tonight, thanks to the archives on League Pass broadband -- Allen Iverson's Piston debut and the Hawks blowing out the Raps in the dirty dirty -- but I think I'm going to see Zack and Miri Make a Porno, my first trip to the movies since I saw Thank You For Smoking in 2005. If time allows, I'll post some thoughts on these three upcoming opponents later in the weekend, then get ready for a tough week.