NBA schedule: Clippers, Thunder meet up in battle of league’s best

The Oklahoma City Thunder and Los Angeles Clippers play in the clear winner among four games on Tuesday night, as the matchup featuring teams with the two best records in the league square off for the second time on the year. Here's tonight's full schedule, including that eagerly anticipated showdown:

Boston Celtics (20-20) vs. Cleveland Cavaliers (10-32), 7 p.m., Comcast SportsNet New England, Fox Sports Ohio: It was four losses in a row for the Celtics, then six wins, and now, three losses, as a team stacked with proven veterans can't figure out how to play consistently so far this year. The Cavs would seem like an easy win for Boston, record-wise, but two of the Celtics' three losses on this trip have come against the New Orleans Hornets and Detroit Pistons, neither of whom are particularly elite. The Cavaliers just got the bad news that Anderson Varejao will miss the rest of the year with a blood clot, but he's already been sitting with a knee injury, leaving the team starting young bigs Tristan Thompson and Tyler Zeller up front.

Orlando Magic (14-26) vs. Detroit Pistons (15-25), 7:30 p.m., Fox Sports Florida, Fox Sports Detroit: The Magic have lost seven straight against teams with losing records, a surprising number even for a team that also has more losses than wins. They've sprinkled in wins against the Clippers and Indiana Pacers behind strong games from Arron Afflalo and J.J. Redick, but besides those two wins, lost their last 10 games. Meanwhile, the Pistons have genuinely turned into a decent squad since losing their first eight of the year, just a couple of games below .500 since. Detroit will be trying to take one in this season series after losing the first two.

Philadelphia 76ers (17-24) vs. Milwaukee Bucks (21-18), 8 p.m., Comcast SportsNet Philly, Fox Sports Wisconsin: The Bucks are 5-2 under Jim Boylan, with Ersan Ilyasova playing his best ball of the season since being promoted into the starting lineup by Boylan -- he had 27 and 14 in the team's win over the Portland Trail Blazers. Both teams are led by young guards, and in the first matchup between these two, Brandon Jennings got the best of Jrue Holiday, putting up 33 points and eight assists while Holiday had 25, but committed eight turnovers.

Oklahoma City Thunder (32-9) vs. Los Angeles Clippers (32-10), 10:30 p.m., NBATV, Fox Sports Oklahoma, Fox Sports Prime Ticket: The winner here leaves the Staples Center with the league's best record, as the game features a potential preview of the Western Conference Finals. The Thunder had won six straight before an overtime loss to the Denver Nuggets Sunday, falling short despite 37 combined points between Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, while the Clips had won four -- including all three without Chris Paul in the lineup -- before falling to the Golden State Warriors in a game where Paul only had four points on Monday. The first game with these two lived up to the hype, with the Clippers rallying back from a game-long deficit to push it to overtime, where OKC won, 117-111.