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Opening night setback: Cavaliers fall flat in loss to Celtics 95-89
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Last season the Cavaliers didn't lose a home game until February 8th when they finally lost to the Lakers at Quicken Loans Arena. Tuesday night in front of a usual sold out crowd, the team dropped their first home game of the year, losing to a mentally touger Boston Celtics team 95-89.
The team will have less than 24 hours to put the loss behind them, as they have a quick turnaround to head to Canada to take on the Raptors on Wednesday night.
The Good:
* The Cavs jumped out to a quick 19-5 lead, their biggest of the game. The starting five looked like they would have their way with the Celtics, but then quickly the tide changed and the team led by just seven at the end of one.
* LeBron James scored a game-high 38 points, but also needed 44:55 to do it. He was 12-for-22 from the field, and 10-for-13 from the free throw line.
* The Cavs outscored the Celtics 32-26 in points in the paint.
* Cleveland had 9 blocks, including an outstanding highlight block by James early in the game that quickly brought the crowd to their feet.
The Bad:
* The Cavs looked to be on fire from the start, going up 19-5 with 7:03 left in the first quarter. From there though they didn't move the ball around enough, and started to settle for jump shots, and did too much of watching LeBron with the ball. The 14-point early lead was quickly down to 7 at the end of one.
* Paul Pierce killed the Cavs all night. He had a double-double with a team-high 23 points and a game-high 11 rebounds in 38 minutes.
* The Cavs shot 52% in the first quarter, but ended the night shooting just 41%. Mike Brown admitted that the team didn't attack the basket enough, and allowed the offense to fall into sets of taking too many jump shots, which was their downfall on the offensive end.
* The bench did little, more so in the first half when the Cavs bench was outscored 17-4. The only two players to score off the bench in the first half were Daniel Gibson (2) and Jamario Moon (2).
* The Cavs defense was totally out of sync it seemed like all night, and allowed for Boston to take way too many uncontested shots. Boston had 9 wide open shots in the first half, and on the night Boston was 9-for-19 from three-point range.
The Ugly:
* The Cavs have to make a decision on what to do with Delonte West. The team officially has no comment on the weekend issues regarding he and his wife, and there's rumblings all over about the team taking a long look at Antonio Daniels. Assistant GM Chris Grant said before the game on AM 930 WEOL that the team would continue to take a process to allow West time to come back. It's tough to watch him standing around in street clothes when the team could have used him tonight.
* Mike Brown laid the foundation for tonight's letdown after the Cavs fell to the Celtics in the last preseason game last week in Columbus, OH. He said that he felt the team could start slow, and after the energy in the crowd and some early hot shooting got them off to a fast start, the team was just not the same club that won 66 games a season ago over the final three quarters.
Finally:
* Brown has to decide when to put in and take out Shaq O'Neal, who played 28:48 and ended the night with 10 points and 10 rebounds with a block. Brown pulled him seven minutes into the game, which seemed to sap some of the early energy from the team, more so on defense.
* Toronto on the road on a back-to-back isn't going to be a cakewalk. Despite the Raptors going 33-49 last season, the team has players that can score - Chris Bosh, Hedo Turkoglu, and Jose Calderon. If the Cavs think they can just roll out tomorrow night and win, they could be 0-2 heading to Minnesota on Friday.
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