Celtics fend off resilient Cavs, win 112-106 in Cleveland

The Boston Celtics survived a resilient Cleveland Cavaliers — and several low blows — to come up with a road win Wednesday night.

The Boston Celtics came to Cleveland to face a Cavaliers franchise roughly as banged-up as they were Wednesday night, each franchise down several key players due to injury.

Boston came out a little slow and let Cleveland jump out to a 6-2 lead, but the Celtics quickly took control with a 10-0 run punctuated by a pair of treys from All-Star forward Jayson Tatum, forcing an early timeout.

The Cavs answered back with a 7-0 run of their own to push the lead down to 15-12 with 6 minutes and 30 seconds left in the frame, and would retake the lead with a 3-pointer from Kevin Love with just under four minutes remaining.

An Enes Kanter trip to the free throw line on the subsequent possession would erase that lead, and the Celtics would close the first quarter up 28-27.

The second quarter began with a trip for center Robert Williams III, though he missed both.

Forward Semi Ojeleye would hit a pair of rare treys, and two way guard Tremont Waters would hit a jumper in between them to give Boston a 36-27 lead.

As Tatum began to warm up, the Celtics began to pull away.

He and Ojeleye helped fuel an 8-0 run that would put the Celtics up 56-43 with 3:30 to go in the half before the SMU product went down with a knee to the groin that would send him to the locker room shortly before the break.

The Cavs would mount a comeback and erase most of their deficit, but were still down 58-52 to close out the half.

The penultimate quarter again began with a trip to the line, this time for center Daniel Theis, who converted one of two. Cleveland kept the pressure on, and would wrest back a 61-59 lead on a Collin Sexton layup with just under 10 minutes to play in the frame.

Time Lord would start to come alive on offense as Boston fought back, retaking the lead on a pair of buckets by the Louisiana native with some defensive help from Ojeleye, who returned to the game.

The Cavs stayed close throughout the quarter, Sexton tying it 75-up briefly before a Kanter basket, a midrange Tatum stepback and a last-second dunk by rookie Grant Williams would give Boston a 81-77 lead going into the fourth quarter.

Both teams battled bucket-for-bucket despite the Celtics losing rookie Romeo Langford early in the quarter to illness throughout the final frame, Boston holding a small lead for most of the fourth quarter.

Key late buckets by Tatum, Ojeleye and guard Marcus Smart helped the Celtics get some separation, and Boston would win a hard-fought game 112-106.

The Boston Celtics next take on the Utah Jazz at TD Garden at 8pm ET on Friday, March 6th.

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