The Celtics will host a battle between two 3-1 teams Friday night, as the Cleveland Cavaliers come to Boston riding a three-game winning streak.
With a bolstered backcourt and a formidable frontcourt, Cleveland is shaping up to be a dark horse in the Eastern Conference and should be a great test for a Boston team that’s coming off its first loss of the season.
The first word that comes to mind when C’s interim head coach thinks of this Cavs team is “Big.” They’ve got twin towers in their frontcourt with 6-foot-11 center Jarrett Allen and 7-foot power forward Evan Mobley. Allen was an All-Star last season, while Mobley was the runner-up in the Rookie of the Year voting. Combined, they’re averaging 29.0 points, 16.3 rebounds, and 2.5 blocks per game while anchoring the second-best defense in the NBA.
“A big team playing very well together,” Mazzulla said Thursday afternoon following practice. “A balanced team, very good defensively. On the offensive end, they really work to find an advantage and make the right read. It’s going to be a great matchup for us and we’re looking forward to it.”
Unfortunately for the Celtics, this is one game in which they will be extra shorthanded up front; they’ll be missing not one Williams, but two. Grant Williams will be serving a one-game suspension after making contact with and directing inappropriate language toward an official during Monday night’s loss to the Chicago Bulls. Meanwhile, Rob Williams continues to recover from offseason knee surgery.
This means the C’s are going to have to dig deep behind starting center Al Horford and look for help from other bigs such as Noah Vonleh, Luke Kornet, and Blake Griffin, as well as some of their stronger wings.
“I think it’s an opportunity to continue to see different things, use our depth, see how we can adjust to their size,” said Mazzulla. “But at the same time, we have to focus on our strengths. We have speed, we have skill, we have a lot of space. So it’s a good challenge for us, a good opportunity for our depth. We’ll have to kind of reinvent ourselves a little bit.”
Cleveland has done a bit of reinventing as well in terms of its backcourt. The Cavs made one of the biggest acquisitions of the offseason by trading for Donovan Mitchell and so far, the three-time All-Star has been tremendous, averaging 28.5 points, 5.0 rebounds, 7.3 assists, and 2.0 steals per game.
Mitchell slides in nicely alongside All-Star point guard Darius Garland; however, Garland is expected to miss his fourth straight game Friday night after suffering a right eye laceration in Cleveland’s season-opener.
Still, Boston will have its hands full against a Cavs perimeter that also includes Caris LeVert, whose career-scoring high of 51 points came against the Celtics three seasons ago.
“Defensively we’re going to have to be right,” said Celtics guard Malcolm Brogdon. “And I think that’s in our favor because defensively, I think we’re the best in the league. We got big guards, we got physical guards, we got smart guards. We’re the team to be able to guard them.”
Boston is going to have to be right offensively as well. So far it has been, as it ranks third in offensive rating while scoring 117-plus points in three out of its first four games.
Though, Cleveland’s second-ranked defense has been just as impressive. The Cavs have won their last three games by double-digits and haven’t allowed more than 108 points in a game this season.