Poirier upgraded to ‘available’ vs. Bulls, Theis downgraded to OUT

Reserve center Vincent Poirier may be poised to return against the Chicago Bulls after being upgraded to available, but Daniel Theis will take his place on the bench with knee soreness.

The Boston Celtics continue to shuffle through their center-by-committee arrangement, as reserve center Vincent Poirier is poised to return to action while starting five Daniel Theis will sit with a balky knee.

Theis’ right knee has been a problem for the German big over the last few weeks, with the Salzgitter native often designated ‘questionable’ on the injury report as a result.

The third-year big man has played through the pain up until now, though, with half of the team’s center rotation out injured until today.

Second-year center Robert Williams III has missed nearly a month due to a carefully-managed left hip bone edema that will be re-evaluated in just over two weeks from today, but has not been available even to practice as his doctors have stressed caution for the Texas A&M product.

Poirier, who has missed roughly as much time as Williams, broke his finger in December and appears ready to return in tonight’s tilt with an injury-depleted Chicago.

The Bulls down several key players of their own from three to five, Boston may be viewing this more as a chance to get Theis some time off ahead of a key stretch this month.

With important games on the schedule looming against the league-leading Milwaukee Bucks (Jan. 16) and second-best Los Angeles Lakers (Jan. 20), any rest they can find for their core players will be a boon with two other contests to take care of in the interim.

In related news, the team is sending rookie shooting guard Carsen Edwards to play with the team’s G League affiliate, the Maine Red Claws.

The first-year bench scorer has had a little trouble getting his shot to fall at the NBA level despite success in the G League, so the thought is simply to get the Purdue prospect more minutes and live game action to get those confidence levels up.

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