Celtics beat Kyrie-less Cavs for 3rd straight win
The Boston Celtics want to keep on winning right into the Eastern Conference playoffs. Word that LeBron James was playing against them Friday was a bit of a damper, but the Cleveland Cavaliers helped them out a little by sitting Kyrie Irving.
The result was a 99-90 Celtics win in Cleveland, Boston's third straight. They remain in seventh place in the East, holding a tiebreaker over the Brooklyn Nets, who also won Friday.
The backcourt rotation of Marcus Smart, Evan Turner and Isaiah Thomas led the C's. Smart finished with 19 points on 7-of-10 shooting, while Thomas had 17 off the bench. Turner only scored four but dished out 13 assists.
The Cavaliers, locked into second in the East, are done jockeying for playoff position and had little to play for. James' 14 points was his lowest output since Nov. 4 in Portland, although he did not play in the fourth quarter.
Afterwards, Turner played hard.
Turner on James not playing the fourth quarter, joking: "I really didn't care. I threw away my LeBron poster after high school."
— Boston Celtics (@celtics) April 11, 2015
Either way, this sequence didn't help LeBron's 5-of-14 shooting:
Kevin Love, on the other hand, had a big night for the Cavs, scoring 19 - including 4-of-8 from beyond the arc.
The Celtics face the Cavaliers again on Sunday on the back end of a home-and-home.