-
Tim Bontemps, ESPN
BOSTON — In the opening minute of the fourth quarter Thursday night, Cleveland Cavaliers star Donovan Mitchell came off a screen at the top of the key and fired up a 3-pointer.
After the shot, which appeared offline as it left his hand, ricocheted off the backboard and through the net, Mitchell could simply shrug as he backpedaled down the court.
It was the same reaction many inside TD Garden had for this one, as Cleveland — fresh off a 25-point loss in Game 1 — responded with a stellar second half in Game 2 against the Boston Celtics, cruising to a 118-94 victory and evening this Eastern Conference semifinal series at a game apiece.
With it, 12.5-point underdog Cleveland pulled off the biggest playoff victory by a double-digit underdog since 1991, nearly doubling the prior largest winning margin, according to ESPN Stats & Information research.
“It’s always good to get a win on the road, but at the end of the day, it’s one game,” Mitchell said after scoring 29 points, including 23 in the second half, as he became the second Cavalier — alongside LeBron James — to score at least 25 in five straight postseason games, according to ESPN Stats & Information. “So it was good to get the win. We did a lot of really positive things. But, at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter.
“You got to go take care of home court. It’s nice to get this win, but at the end of the day, we got one day to prepare and get ready to protect home court.”
Cleveland controlled virtually every aspect of the game, going 13-for-28 from 3-point range, shooting nearly 55% from the field, dominating in points in the paint (60-44) and on the glass (44-31).
“Sometimes it’s assists,” Mitchell said. “Sometimes it’s rebounds. Whatever it takes. And when it was time to go, it’s time to go. I knew at some point I was going to have to start, obviously, shooting.”
That was especially true in the second half, with Cleveland breaking a halftime tie by shooting 62% overall, and 10-for-15 from 3-point range, in the competitive portion of the game before both teams emptied their benches with four minutes to go.
“It was just a bad game,” said Jaylen Brown, who had 32 points in Game 1 but just 19 in Game 2, and was a game-worst minus-29 in 31 minutes. “Obviously we didn’t shoot the ball very well tonight, but defensively it was an unacceptable performance, and I think that’s where we look at that, and I’m the most upset. Defensively we gave up 118 points, and on top of that we lost the rebound battle. So we didn’t help ourselves tonight.”
There were more than a few familiar beats to this loss for Boston. Like they did in the first round against the Miami Heat, the Celtics lost Game 2 of their series after controlling Game 1 against a seemingly overmatched opponent. Cleveland shot the ball very well, while Boston was just 8-for-35 from 3-point range — though Second Spectrum tracking data showed that 77.1% of those triples were heavily contested shots, the highest percentage in any game the Celtics have played with Joe Mazzulla as coach over the past two seasons. And it was yet another loss for Boston at home in the playoffs, as the Celtics are now 14-14 over the past three postseasons at TD Garden.
The significant difference from this performance, however, was the play of Cavaliers center Evan Mobley. Typically the team’s power forward but playing center full time in place of the injured Jarrett Allen (bruised rib), Mobley was fantastic at both ends. He wound up with 21 points, 10 rebounds, 5 assists and 2 blocked shots in 33 minutes, putting up the first 20-10 playoff game of his career, and he was especially impactful at the defensive end of the court.
Boston shot 3-for-11 on attempts within 10 feet of the basket that Mobley defended, per ESPN’s tracking data, while shooting 8-for-21 overall with him as the primary defender.
And when Mobley was guarding Brown and Celtics star Jayson Tatum, the two wings combined to shoot just 2-for-10 from the field.
“That’s where he’s at his best, continuing to protect the paint,” Mitchell said of Mobley. “Especially tonight, having him guard on the ball, and being able to deter them on their shots and layups … it’s not easy attacking Evan like that, so just having him able to be that dominant, but also give us offensive production, was big time.”
Little about this effort was big time for the Celtics, who responded to a relatively flat performance in a comfortable Game 1 victory with an even flatter showing in Game 2.
But, while the Celtics were disappointed with the performance, the message across the board was more or less the same: They’ll get back in the gym Friday, and then head to Cleveland to attempt to regain control of home court Saturday in Game 3.
“Just get ready for Saturday,” said Tatum, who had 25 points but continued his playoff-long shooting struggles by finishing 7-for-17 from the field. “Nobody was in there defeated, deflated. I mean, you never want to lose, especially in the playoffs. There’s a lot of things we can learn from, and we get it … the world thinks we’re never supposed to lose. We’re supposed to win every game by 25. And it’s just not going to be like that all the time.
“We don’t expect it to be easy. These are good teams we’re playing, second round of the playoffs. So this is going to be fun the rest of this series and especially come Saturday. We’ve bounced back plenty of times. We lost, what, 16 games this year? So I like to think that we respond pretty well the few times we do lose.”
