Wednesday, October 28, 2009
By BRIAN WINDHORST
LeBron James had 38 points and eight assists to lead Cleveland.
CLEVELAND — The new-look Cavaliers are still suck in shrink wrap.
In the much-anticipated season opener with the rival Boston Celtics Tuesday, the Cavs discovered some new problems and remembered some old ones as they were simply out-played in a 95-89 loss.
It was an impressive effort by the Celtics, who got some nice contributions from their new players while the traditional Big Three seemed to hum along at their practiced pace. Which served as contrast to the Cavs, who didn’t get the results they’re hoping for from their new players while falling into some habits that made it look like a Cavs-Celtics game from the 2008 playoffs.
LeBron James was every bit himself, putting forth a gem in the beginning of his Most Valuable Player defense with 38 points, eight assists, four blocks and two steals. He scored 15 in the fourth quarter when the Cavs tried a vigorous comeback, which was the problem.
“We’re in a transition period right now,” James said. “We need to get better on both sides of the ball.”
It was quite obvious the Cavs were uncomfortable and in search mode from the top on down. Mike Brown was changing lineups and strategies on the fly, the defense was a mess for long stretches and the offense was in its old, but infamous, all-James, all-the-time mode in the final minutes.
This, of course, is what the Cavs were afraid of after a somewhat ineffective preseason.
While there’s plenty of time to deal with those bumps — though the Celtics will have strong bragging rights until the teams meet again on Feb. 25 — perhaps most disturbing was the effect of Shaquille O’Neal in his first real game as a Cav.
He had just 10 points on 5-of-11 shooting with 10 rebounds in 29 minutes. Deeper than those vanilla numbers, however, was his inability to deliver for the Cavs at all in the fourth quarter.
Three times James went to him with the score tight and the game on the line and three different times he was unable to come through. It was kudos to Kendrick Perkins, who swatted him on one key fourth-quarter possession, and Kevin Garnett who often helped.
He was just part of the offensive issues during the evening, which saw the Cavs shoot just 41 percent and have some downright woeful possessions when the game was still quite winnable.
Without O’Neal getting going and with Mo Williams — who had just 12 points and two in the fourth quarter — laboring, the offense just fell to James creating everything.
After slow rotations and dribble penetration saw the Celtics get plenty of open looks on the way to building a 15-point lead in the third quarter, the Cavs finally got into a bit of groove defensively. But they wasted their chance. After cutting the lead down to four points in the fourth, they scored just four points in a stretch of seven possessions.
Meanwhile, Brown was trying about everything. He played James the whole second half and 45 minutes overall, stuff not seen since two seasons ago. At one point in the fourth quarter he played small with James at power forward and Anderson Varejao at center. Then he played seven straight minutes with Zydrunas Ilgauskas and O’Neal in the game together, a look he barely showed in the preseason.
“I did not do a good job with substitutions; we didn’t always have flow,” Brown said. “I’ll figure that out soon.”