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Riding high off their Game 2 win, the Cleveland Cavaliers have some big news. They will host the Boston Celtics for Game 3 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals and could see the return of some familiar faces.
No, it won’t be Ty Jerome (ankle) or Craig Porter Jr. (knee) who have been sidelined for the Cavs for quite a while. Instead, forward Dean Wade, who has missed Cleveland’s last 28 games between the regular season and playoffs due to personal reasons and a nagging knee injury, has been upgraded to questionable for Game 3 against Boston and will likely be a game-time decision.
Joining Wade as a game-time decision is big man Jarrett Allen, who has missed the last five postseason games for the Cavs due to a nagging rib injury that has left him in excruciating pain. While Allen has been working with Cleveland’s training staff to get him back in action, his availability will depend on how he’s feeling leading up to Game 3’s tip-off.
If Allen were to return to action, it would give the Cavs an imposing, physical edge against the Celtics as they look to take the series lead while defending home court. But whenever Allen has been on the court this postseason, that’s been the standard he carries himself with and expects from his teammates.
But with Wade, it’s been a while since he last played for Cleveland. And against Boston, he could become a crucial factor if there isn’t a ton of rust after missing nearly two months of action.
What could the Cavs get from Dean Wade?
Wade last played when Cleveland knocked off the Minnesota Timberwolves at home in early March. In 33 minutes of action, Wade finished with zero points, four rebounds, two assists, one block, and two fouls, drawing the start for a then-injured Max Strus.
It’s understandable if you forgot Wade’s performance or his quiet outing in a frustrating road loss to the Atlanta Hawks since both games were in the wake of what he did to the Celtics in arguably one of the Cavs’ biggest regular-season wins. In a back-and-forth home slugfest against Boston, Wade was the X-factor in why Cleveland knocked off Boston at home.
Wade scored 20 points in the fourth quarter, going 7-of-7 from the field and 5-of-5 from three-point range. His putback dunk with 19 seconds remaining punctuated the long-shot come-from-behind victory on a night the Cavs did not have Donovan Mitchell, Max Strus, or Evan Mobley, who Cleveland lost to injury midway through the third quarter in the regular season battle.
“The rim looked really big. It looked like a swimming pool,” Wade said at the time. “It’s a great feeling. It’s kind of like your mind is quiet and the rim looks huge.”
Behind Wade’s fourth-quarter heroics, the Cavs rallied from 22 points down. It was the fourth-largest comeback in franchise history and shocked the league-leading Celtics, snapping their NBA-high 11-game winning streak in front of a sellout crowd that included two special guests — Jason and Travis Kelce.
While it’s unconfirmed if the Kelce brothers will be at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse for Game 3, if Wade returns to the floor for Cleveland and can execute at a similar level to the last time he played against Boston, the Cavs could find momentum in their corner throughout the series.
Wade has become a crucial piece in how Cleveland likes to play with spacing. With how dominant they were in Game 2 with putting shooting around one of their bigs like Evan Mobley, it could further bolster something that the Celtics have struggled to defend and help the Cavs punch a ticket to the Eastern Conference Finals.
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