Kevin Garnett stutter-stepped as he reached a potential right turn down a seemingly endless hallway early yesterday. After losing Game 3, he and Boston teammate Paul Pierce were on their way to a media interview room proving difficult to find.

"Where's it at?" Garnett growled.

That's the Celtics, searching for directions on the NBA's playoff highway.

The kings of the road are lost.

Boston, which went a league-best 31-10 in away games in the regular season, has dropped all four of its road games so far in this postseason, a potentially disturbing trend for a team aiming to win it all. A perfect 6-0 inside noisy TD Banknorth Garden so far in these playoffs, the Celtics dropped to 0-4 on the road Saturday night with a 108-84 loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers at Quicken Loans Arena, who trimmed Boston's lead to 2-1 in this Eastern Conference best-of-seven series.

Game 4 is tonight, and unless the green-and-white can cure their home sickness, their commanding lead will be gone.

Of course, holding the home-court advantage trump card throughout the playoffs gives the Celtics a safety net. They can continue to lose on the road as long as they win all their home games. But one little misstep on their parquet floor could lead to an early slide into summer.

A slower-than-slow start doomed the Celtics in Game 3. They fell behind by 19 points after the first quarter, were down by an eye-popping, 43-17, in the second and never mounted a serious threat after halftime as the Cavaliers destroyed a team with a collective 72-20 record this season.

"We can't spot a team 15-20 points and try to dig ourselves out of it," Garnett said. "We talked about that in the locker room, that we need to play with the same urgency like we have at home. We can definitely play better, and we will."

What's most puzzling about the Celtics' road woes is that they played so well while living out of their suitcases during the regular season. They won almost everywhere, even blowing through San Antonio, Houston and Dallas to win consecutive games in a rare Texas-three step of wins.

It was the first time Boston had won three in a row in the Lone Star State since 1987, and the Celts became the first team to nail the Texas trifecta since the Sacramento Kings in 2001.

His team backed into a 3-1 corner in the Eastern Conference semifinals, Orlando guard Jameer Nelson guaranteed a victory when the series returns to Detroit tomorrow.

"We're going to make some adjustments and we're going to win this game," Nelson said after Orlando's 90-89 loss Saturday. "I'm not being arrogant or cocky or anything like that. I think [Saturday] we let it slip out of our hands. Game 2 we let it slip out of our hands. We're going to win this game in Detroit."

That's a tall order for a Magic team that couldn't even the series at home despite a 15-point, third-quarter lead against a Pistons team that had All-Star point guard Chauncey Billups sitting on the bench in a sport coat. Even so, Orlando remains optimistic.

"Devastating is the fourth loss in a series. It's a bad loss but it's not devastating," Magic coach Stan Van Gundy said. "The series goes on."

Forward Ronny Turiaf was ejected early in the second quarter of Game 4 of the Western Conference semifinals against the Utah Jazz yesterday for a flagrant foul. Turiaf knocked Utah's Ronnie Price hard to the floor as Price drove for a layup.