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James, Cavaliers ride crest of emotional win

Apr 1, 2007 - 1:58 PM Cleveland (44-29) at Boston (22-50) 6:00 pm EDT

BOSTON (Ticker) -- LeBron James took matters into his hands and kept the Cleveland Cavaliers in second place in the Eastern Conference.

Coming off one of their most impressive wins of the season, James and the Cavaliers visit the Boston Celtics on Sunday.

The Cavaliers appeared to be in danger of falling out of second place in the Eastern Conference on Saturday when they trailed the Chicago Bulls by four points with less than a minute left in overtime. But James converted a three-point play and made a running banker in the last 42 seconds to lead the Cavaliers to a 112-108 victory.

James finished with 39 points and Sasha Pavlovic added 21.

The win enabled the Cavaliers to increase their lead to 1 1/2 games over the Bulls (43-31), who entered the contest in fifth place in the East but could have taken over the second spot.

Cleveland is 2 1/2 games behind Detroit (46-26) for the top spot in the Eastern Conference. The Pistons host Miami on Sunday.

Al Jefferson scored 20 points and Delonte West added 16 in the Celtics' 88-82 loss to Philadelphia on Friday.

In the race for the most ping-pong balls in the highly anticipated draft lottery, Boston remains four games ahead of Memphis (19-55), which owns the league's worst record.