Kevin Garnett scored 19 points to lead Boston Celtics to register a comprehensive victory over Philadelphia 76ers 92-79 on Saturday night.
Jeff Green had 16 points, while Paul Pierce contributed with 13 points. Rajon Rondo scored seven points, 11 assists and chipped in nine rebounds.
For the 76ers, top scorer Thaddeus Young contributed with 22 points and had nine of 15 from the field. Forward Evan Turner finished with 13 in his team's third loss during last four games.
''The difference between us right now and a team like the Celtics, the Celtics have a mental toughness born through championships and night in and night out being a team that has to play every single night because teams come with their best efforts,'' The Associated Press quoted Philadelphia coach Doug Collins as saying. ''They mentally have an incredible approach. Kevin Garnett? I guarantee you his legs weren't the freshest out there tonight, but his mind was the sharpest.''
Turner hit a basket with 3.9 remaining in the previous game in the overtime and made Philadelphia victorious on Friday.
''I love the way we responded tonight,'' Pierce said. ''A lot of the guys were mad for the fact we lost yesterday and we wanted to take it out on them today. We felt that was a winnable game last night and we wanted to do something about it.''
Garnett, who played for 23:26 in the game, had nine of 11 from the field.
''Experience, a lot of it,'' 76ers guard Jrue Holiday said. ''He's been to championships, he's been to finals, he's been to a million playoffs. He's probably played a million and a half minutes, so he's got a lot of experience.''
Boston started off well in the first quarter and scored 24 points, whereas the 76ers added only 16. Philadelphia did not learn from their mistakes and their performance went further down in the second quarter.
The Celtics took an important 20-point lead at halftime and it seemed as if they would finish the game with a huge margin, but Philadelphia bounced back in the third quarter.
The Celtics were leading 65-44 at one point in the third quarter, when Philadelphia added 13 straight points in 2:54 with the help of a couple of baskets from Turner and a three-point shot from Holiday. But Boston managed to enter the fourth quarter with a 70-57 score and kept the momentum going in their favor to win the game by 13 points.
Philadelphia did not shoot well on Saturday and they had only 31 of 79 from the field, whereas the Celtics had 40 of 75.
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