The play was ugly, the effort was slim, a few minutes remained in the first quarter, and the Celtics trailed the Cleveland Cavaliers — yes, the Lebron-less Cavaliers — 21-14. The second quarter was coming soon, which is normally bad, and part of the bench was already in the game, which doesn’t usually bode well for Boston. So, naturally, Rajon Rondo took over the scoring load and the second unit turned the game around.

Wait, huh?

Okay, so it wasn’t the C’s average formula for winning. It still worked. Rondo ended the game with a season high 23 points, to go along with 12 dimes, and the C’s avenged their earlier loss to the Cavs with a 106-87 win.

It was weird to see Rondo call his own number so often, but he was more aggressive going to the hoop than usual. He wasn’t settling for jumpers, for the most part. He was simply beating his man all the way to the hoop. It looked like he saw his teammates lollygagging through another road game, and said, “You know what, guys? Hop on my back, at least until you get your heads out of your asses.”

When Rondo started doing his scoring damage, he was surrounded by the second unit that has been much-maligned in recent days. But the reserves were splendid tonight, almost every single one of them. (Yes, the almost is mostly intended for Nate Robinson. I liked his eight points. The ten shots it took to score said eight points, not so much, even if all the shots were good looks.)

Marquis Daniels took advantage of good matchups and opportunities throughout the game. Doc Rivers upheld his vow to mix and match the first and second unit, and one of the units he concocted included Daniels as the shooting guard, alongside Pierce at small forward. With a small shooting guard (Boobie Gibson) defending him, Daniels was free to unleash his advanced post game. Gibson was no match for the array of herky-jerky up fakes Daniels offered, which Daniels only needed to utilize when his sheer size wasn’t enough. The braided, part-time rapper scored 16 points, another season high.

Also excelling on the bench was Glen Davis. That has become pretty normal, even if Rivers wasn’t thrilled with Davis’s production the last few games. Davis scored inside, he scored outside, and most importantly he didn’t force any bad shots. Of course, he didn’t need to force any bad shots — devouring Antawn Jamison was easy enough. It’s weird seeing Jamison now, but he used to be an All-Star. Even as recently as last season, he was supposed to be the key to a Cavaliers championship. Strange to think about now, no? I know Jamison’s not always as bad as he was tonight, but still. Alright, enough about Jamison — back to Davis. Ramon Sessions, Glen Davis does not allow you access to his kitchen.

Kevin Garnett notched a double-double, even though he didn’t play great. Shaq played like a man who didn’t practice any of the last three days, which he actually is. The Big Diesel made one beautiful touch pass, but also decided to conserve his energy defensively. On at least four occasions I noticed, Cleveland big men took jumpers while Shaq laid five or six feet off, with his hands by his side. Not too surprising, but not at all perfect.

Moving on, who else am I supposed to talk about? Ray Allen didn’t do much, but one floater he made was magnificent. Paul Pierce thought he was Dwight Howard for a little while. Semih Erden scored zero points and snatched only three rebounds, but still somehow pleased me, likely because of his two blocks and solid energy. There were even Luke Harangody, Avery Bradley and Von Wafer sightings, which was exciting if ultimately not very life-altering.

Also, it was sad to see the Lebron-less Quicken Loans Arena. I’m normally against arenas playing music during games, but Cleveland is an exception. Without music, the arena would sound like someone hit the mute button. The fans are THAT silent in there, or at least they were tonight. The deafening silence wasn’t just because the Cavs were blown out, either. Even when the Cavs started the game with a 12-4 run, you could have heard one of Ray Allen’s swishes from the nose bleeds.

Back to the Celtics, tonight’s win was a good one. Not against the best competition, granted, but the Celtics played well. The second unit started to hum a little, Doc Rivers may have found Marquis Daniels a new position, and the Celtics have now won four games in a row.

If it weren’t for the wedgie I’m currently experiencing, it would be difficult to complain about anything at all.

The Boston Celtics travel to Cleveland tonight, where they will look to avenge an early-season loss at the hands of the mediocre Cavaliers. Here are three keys to the game:

1. Stop the athletes – The Celtics have earned a reputation as a team that struggles against long, athletic players. While I think the reputation is unfair, it is still deserved. How is the reputation unfair yet still deserved? That sounds oxymoronic, right? And maybe it is. But what I mean is this: when the Celtics use full effort, they can — and do — stop long, athletic folks like Anderson Varejao and J.J. Hickson. It’s when the Zombie Celtics come to play that the Celtics are outworked by long athletes. If the effort is there tonight, Hickson and Varejao should be limited. And if the effort isn’t there? Hickson might look like an MVP candidate, and Varejao will probably pull down 15 rebounds or so.

2. Guard play – The three guard/wings Cleveland started against Memphis the other night? Mo Williams, Anthony Parker and Joey Graham. You don’t need a basketball-ology degree to know Rondo should have his way with Williams, and methinks Pierce and Allen should get the best of Parker and Graham.  Parker, by the way, is a statistical anomaly. He’s shooting 51.4% from three-point range, but only 38.3% from the field.

3. The bench – Ahh, my least favorite part of the Celtics team — the bench. Someone besides Glen Davis needs to step up as a consistent contributor soon, and fast, or else. The C’s starters are playing far too many minutes, and for once I can’t even blame Doc Rivers for that – I wouldn’t play that damn bench, either. Every time the second unit steps on the floor, a lead evaporates into thin air. Rivers said it’s time for him to switch his rotations. He can’t keep playing the second five as a single unit, because that unit — in a word — sucks. The rotations Rivers uses are something to keep an eye on. He has to make changes to help the bench, but hopefully those changes won’t hurt the starters’ production.

The Celtics play the Cavaliers tonight, one game before Lebron James visits his old basketball home for the first time. All of which means you’ll be hearing far too much about James in the next few days.

The Cleveland media repeatedly asked the Cavs if they were overlooking Boston, only the Eastern Conference’s best team. Shaq has already been asked about Lebron’s return, and he said two things: first, he doesn’t worry about the game. He just wants to know if Lebron will throw the powder in the air beforehand. And second, if Shaq’s return to Orlando was a six on the vengeance scale of one to ten, Lebron’s return to Cleveland is a twelve.

I’m sorry you have to hear about James all the time. I really am. But I’m also going to discuss him here, in this space. In other words, I will now contribute to the problem I just apologized for. This is where I apologize for the second time in the same paragraph.

My beef is with Adrian Wojnarowski’s latest piece on Lebron. I get that Woj finds Lebron to be everything wrong with sports. I understand that. In a way, I agree with it. But there comes a time when we need to stop blaming everything on Lebron. There comes a time when the other people in the Heat organization should take a little flak, too. Not everything is Lebron’s fault. Not everything that goes wrong should be blamed on the two-time defending MVP.

Look, I love Woj’s work more than life itself. I’m currently re-reading “The Miracle of St. Anthony” for the 1,113th time (estimate only), and I consider it one of the greatest pieces of sports journalism ever penned. But Woj has a tendency to pin all of Miami’s problems on Number Six, and sometimes it just isn’t fair.

Woj’s latest column on the Heat mentioned a quote from Dwyane Wade that threw Erik Spoelstra under the bus, while not directly throwing Spoelstra under the bus. “I’m not going to say he’s ‘my guy,’ but he’s my coach,” Wade said. Wade, keep in mind, is a former NBA Finals MVP, one of the five best players in basketball, and owner of a personality strong enough to be his own man. Yet Woj felt free to blame James for Wade’s apparent sour attitude toward Spoelstra.

As much as ever, the Heat need Wade to influence James. Only now, it’s clear James is influencing Wade. With Udonis Haslem out for the regular season, the locker room misses one of its vital voices. Now, Wade is struggling on the floor and James is the devil on his shoulder, whispering that he doesn’t need to be accountable, that there’s an easy fall guy for everyone: Spoelstra.

Sure, Wade is the one who wouldn’t back his coach, but it’s Lebron’s fault. This was always going to be Lebron’s fault, if anything failed, no matter what it was. Lebron is the two-time MVP, and he’s the one who risked his legacy by teaming with Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh. If the Heat fail, regardless of how well Lebron plays, that failure will always rest on his shoulders. And so it was that Woj, in a piece preaching how James should be more accountable, offers Wade a way to escape accountability altogether: just blame Lebron.

One gets the feeling Woj would also blame Lebron for the BP oil spill, World War II, and Angelina from the Jersey Shore, if he could.

I’m not saying Lebron has zero fault in this whole mess. It’s very possible he leaked the ESPN story about Miami players doubting Spoelstra, as Woj claims. It’s very possible he returned his cold french fries to a renowned chef — wait, what? It’s very possible he doesn’t respond well to the word “no.”

All signs say Lebron James a spoiled, narcissistic baby who has rarely, if ever, been held accountable for his own mistakes.. But in trying to hold him accountable for his own misdeeds, let’s not also blame him for the mistakes of others. There are a lot of things to blame on Lebron James. Dwyane Wade’s opinion of Erik Spoelstra is one thing that just isn’t Lebron’s fault.

And Spoelstra? It’s nice that he is standing up to Lebron, like Mike Brown never did. It’s nice he’s telling Lebron “no” sometimes. But if Spoelstra expects to keep his job, and to keep from losing his own locker room, he should figure out a way to make his talented team work. That, not just repeatedly saying “no”, is what coaches are supposed to do.

Delonte West underwent successful surgery this morning to repair what Celtics officials referred to as a ”displaced right wrist fracture.” Not that you care, but the surgery was performed at New England Baptist Hospital.

The timetable for West’s return is still unknown, but, before the surgery, Doc Rivers told CSNNE he hopes West can be ready for the playoffs. Wait, the playoffs? Like, four and a half months away? Yikes.

My hope is that West can return sooner than the playoffs, so that he will be in shape when the postseason begins. Having some time on the court to get acclimated to his teammates, before the playoffs, couldn’t hurt.

For the Celtics sake, I wish the injury had never happened. For Delonte’s sake, I worry. I can only hope he takes the setback well.

If you have ever read this blog before, you’re probably aware that Austin Rivers is Doc’s son. Austin is the proud owner of the fourth-ranked highlight on this mixtape. The player in the fifth-ranked highlight, Nick Johnson, also has Celtics ties. Nick is the late Dennis Johnson’s nephew. He has kangaroo bounce, and will be headed to Arizona in the fall.

If occasional meltdowns in the NBA weren’t inevitable, the Boston Celtics should be undefeated.

Look at the Celtics’ four losses: The first was a second-half failure against the Lebron James-less Cleveland Cavaliers. The next was a fourth-quarter breakdown of execution, against the Dallas Mavericks. The third was an embarrassment at the hands of  the Kevin Durant-less OKC Thunder, and the fourth (and most recent) loss was to the Raptors  — yes, the miserable, now 6-11 Raptors.

Had the Boston Celtics not fallen apart on those four separate occasions, their record would sit at 16-0. Which is why Glen Davis lost his ability to speak our language.

“We don’t know no English,” Glen Davis told the Boston Herald. Read that sentence one more time, with the eyes of an English teacher. Clearly, Davis wasn’t lying. “All we know is ‘kill.’ That’s it. No more English. Switzerland. That’s all we know is ‘kill.’ Kill, kill, kill. That’s our mentality. That’s how we have to be the rest of the season — not taking Toronto for granted, not taking Cleveland for granted. No days off. We should be undefeated right now.”

No more English. Switzerland. All the Celtics know is kill. Words that would make me far more comfortable if I hadn’t seen the Celtics play these past couple seasons, if I hadn’t seen them play down to competition like a sympathetic big brother. Don’t get me wrong, I would obviously invite a killer instinct. If the Celtics brought back the 2008 “blow teams out by as many as we can” mentality, I’d be the happiest man on earth. I just don’t see it happening.

These aren’t your 2008 Celtics. They aren’t hell-bent on proving themselves as winners to the world, and, maybe more importantly, themselves. Those Celtics were wired differently. The Big Three had never won a championship, and spent every night demonstrating themselves worthy of a title. The opportunity to thrash teams was new, and it was exciting, and it was so much fun. The Celtics, that year, weren’t just thrilled to play elite teams — they were thrilled to play every team. Being able to slap teams around was something the Big Three had never done before, and it was exhilirating. They attacked each game like Clubber Lang — the Celtics weren’t just another fighter, they were a wrecking machine. And they were hungry.

Their new squad was like a new Christmas toy. It was something to fiddle with, to enjoy, to obsess over. But before long, the novelty of a Christmas toy goes away. The Celtics grew used to smoking unworthy teams. They won a championship, and no longer had to prove themselves every night. They were champions, and nobody could take that away from them. But that hunger to win every game by thirty? That undying need to prove themselves every night? It wasn’t there anymore, and I doubt it will return. The Celtics have proven themselves champions. They don’t have to pounds sub-.500 teams into the ground anymore to convince the league’s followers of their abilities.

At one point, the only word the Celtics knew was “kill.” Kill, kill, kill. But killing, maiming every opponent in their path, no longer holds so much importance. The Celtics will be title contenders when the playoffs roll around, and that’s all that matters now. The time to prove themselves every night has passed. Now, the Boston Celtics have only one goal, and that’s to win a championship.

I agree with what you’re probably thinking: the Celtics can still win a championship while attempting to steamroll every opponent on the schedule. But at the end of the season, when everything’s said and done, a regular season loss to the Toronto Raptors will be forgotten.

There’s only one thing that can make this season a success, and it’s not a 70-win season, and it’s not accumulating forty blowouts of the league’s worst teams, and it’s not becoming the Eastern Conference’s first seed. It’s a banner, dummy.

And no matter how many times the Celtics stoop to their competition in the regular season (and I assume it will happen, at least periodically, throughout the season), I trust them come playoff time. That’s when the Clubber Lang mentality returns. That’s when the wrecking machine comes out of the closet. That’s when the Celtics forget how to speak English and remember only one word:

Eighteen.