Seventeen wins in their first 20 games of the season certainly made the Cleveland Cavaliers feel good about hosting the defending champion Boston Celtics on Sunday night.
Although Boston came to town riding a seven-game winning streak, it was without its top two players in Jaylen Brown (illness) and Derrick White (foot) and had just come off a 138-129 slugfest against the Chicago Bulls. the night before.
Cleveland had a great opportunity to get revenge on the Celtics, and they didn’t let it slip away.
The Cavaliers handed Boston its first loss since Nov. 12, pulling out a 115-111 victory after facing a 12-point deficit with 8:09 left in the fourth quarter.
And Cleveland fans should enjoy all these wins, because the Cavaliers are nowhere near the Celtics’ level—no matter what the scoreboard says Sunday.
When the two teams met two weeks ago, it was Cleveland that was short-handed, as Isaac Okoro, Caris LeVert and Dean Wade were all absent in their 120-117 loss that ended the Cavaliers’ season-opening, 15-game winning streak. .
Cleveland was also held down by Darius Garland, who went 3-for-21 from the field in the Nov. 19.
We have yet to see Boston and the Cavaliers compete at full strength, but we can tell you that Brown and White move the needle more than Okoro, LeVert and Wade. The Celtics faced more adversity in Sunday’s loss than Cleveland faced in their mid-November setback.
It also took a superhuman performance from Donovan Mitchell to get the Cavaliers to even the season series with Boston at 1-1. Mitchell exploded for 20 points on 6-of-6 shooting from the field and 4-of-4 from 3-point range in the fourth quarter. He really needed to be perfect to make sure Cleveland won.
Impressive? Yes. But such a performance only won the Cavaliers a battle, not a war.
As important as it is, Sunday’s game won’t be on anyone’s mind if Cleveland faces the Celtics at any point during the playoffs, especially if that matchup happens in the Eastern Conference finals. At that point, it’s been a seven game streak. And if both teams are healthy, Boston doesn’t let the Cavaliers get four wins before they do.
Cleveland is a regular season team until they prove otherwise. The Cavaliers have two playoff berths in the past six seasons, were swept in the first round of the 2023 season before reaching the Eastern Conference semifinals—at the hands of the Celtics—this past spring.
In those same six seasons, Boston made two trips to the playoffs, two more trips to the Eastern Conference Finals, and one to the semis. Got a chance to go out in the first round in 2021.
This Celtics team is special. Don’t let one loss make you forget that Boston is shooting 19.1 threes a night, has five scorers averaging at least 16.0 points per contest and hasn’t dropped three games in a row since the 2023 playoffs.
So celebrate now, Cleveland. There will be no reason that in six months.
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