I doubt Brown is expecting to run into Houston in the Finals. For that to happen, the Rockets would have to eliminate the Lakers, the Nuggets or the Spurs, and all of these teams are better and deeper than Houston is.

Brown has no reason to think about the Lakers, the Nuggets or the Spurs either. None of those teams are in the East, which will be a minefield of its own for Brown and his Cavaliers.

He has two powerhouses in the East that should concern him: the Magic and the Celtics. And somewhere along the way to the NBA Finals, his Cavaliers will have to eliminate one or both of these teams.

And they will need Shaq to do it.

Yet even as much as the Cavs will need Shaq, they will need what Brown hasn't seen much of this season: an unshakable will.

"It has to be our identity for 48 minutes," Brown said. "That's something that myself and LeBron need to capture. The will we showed in the second half is who we want to become - simple as that."

The will that Brown referred to comes and goes like a snowstorm. The Cavs have looked, at times this season, as if they could beat an Olympic Dream Team, but then they've turned around and looked as if they would have trouble beating New Jersey.

Part of their uneven play might not be so much a lack of will as it is still trying to adjust to a plodding presence in the middle. The Cavs have never had a center like Shaq. What team has?

Trying to build an offensive and defensive scheme that incorporates Shaq's strengths and minimizes his weaknesses is what has occupied Brown's thinking.

Is Brown, whose X's and O's have drawn criticism, capable of putting together such a strategy?

He's smart, so he should sort this all out soon enough.

As he does, he will have to remember that Shaq is closer to the last days of his career than he is to the beginning of his career. So Shaq's minutes have to be watched, because Brown will need him strong and able - as able as a man Shaq's age can be - for the long pull of the season.

He's already missed a couple of games, and he player 23 minutes Friday before leaving the game in the third quarter with an injury to his left eye. Brown was unsure of the injury's extent, though he never hinted he was worried about it.

For one night, he had no reason to worry. For he saw the Shaq he hoped for when the season began. It wasn't 30-plus minutes of Shaq; it was more than enough Shaq, however, for Brown to ponder the possibilities.

And those possibilities might be utterly endless if Brown can coax more performances from Shaq O'Neal that resembled the game he played in the win over Portland.