CELTICS GREEN BLOG by and for boston celtics fans: Celtics and Cavs Clash for the Second Time

Boston Celtics (2-1) vs Cleveland Cavaliers (0-2)
Tuesday, October 14
Petersen Events Center
Pittsburgh, PA
7:30 PM
TV: CSN
Radio: WEEI

Probable Starting Matchups
PG: Rajon Rondo vs Mo Williams
SG: Ray Allen vs Wally Szczerbiak
SF: Paul Pierce vs LeBron James
PF: Kevin Garnett vs Ben Wallace
C: Kendrick Perkins vs Zydrunas Ilgauskas

Players to Watch

Tony Allen/Kendrick Perkins/Patrick O'Bryant/Bill Walker
Tony Allen finished with 25 points, 4 rebounds, and 3 assists in his last game against the Cavs. The next night his play was very shaky against the Rockets. The Celtics are looking for some consistency from Tony. If Perk plays as expected, the Celtics will be watching to see how he plays and how his conditioning is going after being out with the injury. It will also be interesting to see how O'Bryant reacts to being moved to the bench and playing mostly with the second unit. Finally, Bill Walker has been the story after each of the Celtics first 3 games and it will be interesting to see what the Celtics get from him in this game. He is fast becoming a Celtics fan favorite and the player other teams love to hate.

Players to Watch

Zydrunas Ilgauskas/Wally Szczerbiak/Mo Williams/Ben Wallace

Zydrunas Ilgauskas is playing very well and is averaging 14 points, 3.5 rebounds, and shooting 76% in 21 minutes per game so far in the preseason. He will be a good test for the Celtics centers. Wally is one of 3 players fighting for the SG spot on this team. With Delonte out for personal reasons and with Sasha Pavlovic out with an ankle injury, Wally has been the SG by default. He needs to earn the spot, however. Mo Williams was brought in to take some of the scoring load off of LeBron and so far has been playing well. Ben Wallace played only 5 minutes in the first game vs the Celtics and his skill level has slipped considerably at this point in his career. It will be interesting to see how much he still has left.

Game Notes
This is the second preseason meeting of these two Eastern conference rivals. The Celtics came out ahead 96-94 in their first meeting as the Celtics youngsters out played the Cavs youngsters down the stretch. The Celtics were led by Tony Allen who scored 25 points and pulled down 4 rebounds. The Celtics 3 stars all played less than 10 minutes in this game. LeBron played just under 14 minutes.

From the reports out of practice, Perk is expected to play in this game. He had a good practice on Monday and we should see him in this game although his minutes may be limited. The starters should all play limited minutes again, although it will probably be more than the 10 minutes they played in the first meeting between these two teams. Even if it is just for a short time, the matchup between Paul Pierce and LeBron James is always a good one.

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