Welp. LeBron James was not going to let his Cleveland Cavaliers be embarrassed in three consecutive games, so the outcome of this game—a Cavs win—is hardly surprising. The game being a wire-to-wire 116-86 blowout in which the Boston Celtics never had a chance is…considerably more surprising. Cs didn’t appear confident or in rhythm on either side of the ball, and despite their poor defensive pedigree, the Cavs turned up the intensity, particularly in terms of rebounding, and made it hell for Boston.
THE GAME FLOW
This game began about as you’d expect, i.e., very well for the Cavs and poorly for the Cs, given one verifiable fact and some baseless speculation:
On one hand, Cleveland was going to play better at home to start, because that’s what roleplayers generally do, and they made some early threes.