Ah, I made it through the whole day yesterday without seeing the infamous clips from the Palace Brawl. Mission accomplished. I couldn't believe all of the articles with "Five Years Later" and thoughts on the brawl from Ron Artest, John Green or Ben Wallace. I mean, I didn't care what these guys thought about the brawl five days after it happened, let alone five years. In five years, John Green has come to realize alcohol probably played a role. Genius. I guess I just moved past it  a while ago.

Now bring on the Cleveland Cavaliers!

Zooming out to the big picture, after beating the Celtics last Saturday, I was hoping the Pacerswould finish the week 2-1 and the month 5-3. Obviously, the first goal demands a win tonight over the visiting Cavs.

No easy task for the Pacers with LeBron Jamesrunning for the other side, but the Pacers do get a little break with two bigs missing the game for the Cavs. Both Shaquille O'Neal and Anderson Varejao will miss the game which should help when the Pacers go small.

Jim O'Brien may not be forced to go small tonight with the likely return of Troy Murphy and Jeff Foster. I wouldn't expect either to play significant minutes but, boy, the Pacers sure could've used both against the Knicksto shake up the play on the floor, and in the case of Murph, spread out the offense and maybe even knock down a shot or two. More options are good when you're desperately searching for something to work.

After the jump, a few links of interest along with another edition of the Crate (sans guest Star Wars character).

• PACERS: Pacers-Cavs preview
  Bruno offers the prep work for tonight's game along with the good news about Foster, Murphy and Dunleavy participating in full-court work during practice yesterday.

• LeBron as a Pacer? Why it's not likely
  Mike Wells considers the very unlikely scenario of LeBron James joining the Pacers as a free agent next year. LBJ does look pretty good in the Pacers uni.

• Pacers See Improvement in Different Ways From LeBron James
  Larry Hawley hears from the Pacers as they prepare to take on LeBron James and the Cavs.

• A few more observations from Bird's nest
  Dan Shaughnessy catches up with Larry Bird on a whole host of topics from his past with the Celtics to the present with the Pacers.

•  Lessons of Pacers-Pistons brawl still being learned 5 years later
  Mark Montieth looks back at the lessons learned from the brawl at the Palace, your only brawl-related link of the day since it doesn't pander to the participants.
• PACERS: Pacers to Host Annual Come to Our House Dinner Thursday
• On the latest episode of Pacers Crate, Bruno, Boyle and Denari bat around the positive play of Tyler Hansbrough despite no training camp for the rookie.