Kendrick Perkins was right there with LeBron James as he drove to the basket on a fast break. By the time James got to the hoop, Perkins was poised to stop him from scoring. He threw his body into the sprinting star, drawing a flagrant foul and strong reaction from the sidelines.

The play did more than prompt a whistle -- it sparked a 10-0 run by the Cavs and pushed their lead up to 12, a big enough differential to take control of the game just halfway through the first quarter.

On the box score, that play appeared to be a turning point. But ask the Cavaliers, and it’s clear they were motivated by their own actions, no one else’s. Their commanding Game 3 victory over the Celtics was all about Cavs basketball.

“I don’t think it was the foul,” said Anthony Parker. “I think it was the overall aggressiveness on both ends of the floor from start to finish. I was really excited that we put four quarters together and I thought that was the key. The flagrant foul was what it was and we reacted the way we should, but we just wanted to continue that aggressiveness.”

The Celtics dominated Game 2 on Monday, a convincing 18-point win that sent the series back to Boston tied at one apiece. The Cavs knew they were going into the Celtics building, in front of the Celtics crowd, but that didn’t mean they had to play Celtics basketball.

The Cavs had tunnel vision. They fed off their team chemistry and zoned in on communicating with one another. And as they had done so many times during their 61-win regular season, they followed their leader.

“We all know our role on our team, and we go as he goes,” said J.J. Hickson of James. “With that being said, he got it going tonight so it got the rest of us going, and we got a W.”

James finished the night with a game-high 38 points, scoring 21 points in the first quarter alone. But it was more about going hard after tip-off than after a call.

“We just need to understand that we have to play with a little more sense of urgency from the start. We did tonight. We didn’t wait to be down, we didn’t wait till we got up. Once we got up, we just kept the pedal down,” said James, adding, “We understand that this is the playoffs and every game counts, every possession counts. But everyone playing with a little bit more sense of urgency to start the game will help us.”

But regardless of whether or not Perkins’ flagrant foul added fuel to the Cavaliers’ already-burning fire, it still prompted them to rally around James. The expected Game 3 to be physical (there were 46 personal fouls between the two teams) and they were ready for whatever came at them.

“When something like that happens, everybody reacts like, ‘Hey, what’s going on?’ It’s just the moment because sometimes you know that’s going to happen, but if you don’t expect it [it‘s different]. But we knew the game would be a physical game,” said Anderson Varejao, adding, “Everybody’s got to step up for everybody, and we’ve been doing that for a long time. Tonight wasn’t different. We knew it was going to be a physical game. LeBron knew that, we all knew that, and it’s part of the game too. So all we did was we kept going hard and that’s why we had that run, 10-0.”

Mo Williams simply concurred, “We have to. You’ve got to protect your star. Hard foul, you’ve got to protect him.”

For the Cavaliers, it wasn’t about avenging the hard foul. It wasn’t about pointing blame or calling out their opponents for a tough play. Their comments focused on accomplishing the mission at hand.

“We just knew what we had to do,“ said Shaquille O’Neal. “We didn’t want to come and mess around and lose this game and be down 2-1.”