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BOSTON — For the second time this week, the Boston Celtics got the best of the Chicago Bulls in Beantown. The first beatdown occurred on Monday night when the C's cruised to a 135-99 blowout victory. More recently, Boston held on to a big lead en route to a 125-111 win over Chicago on Friday night. Point guard Payton Pritchard led the Celtics in scoring in both games, recording a combined 58 points (28 points on Monday and 30 points on Friday) in the pair of wins.
The latter showdown fell on Boston Children's Hospital Theme Night at TD Garden and marked the opener for NBA Cup group play, which means the Celtics' 14-point margin of victory matters for the East Group C standings since point differential can act as a tiebreaker. And although the Celtics still beat the Bulls by double digits, they led by as many as 32 points and held a 29-point lead at halftime. The Bulls eventually fought back in the second half and outscored the Green Team 62-47 during that span, however, they didn't do enough to make a real dent in the sizable advantage.
Perhaps that's because Chicago attempted a whopping 50 triples and missed 35 of them. Or, maybe it's because the Celtics infiltrated the Bulls' paint with ease and outscored them 58-40 in that area of the court. Regardless of the reason, the Bulls find themselves near the bottom of the Eastern Conference standings at 1-5 while the Celtics are currently in third place at 4-1.
Let's take a look at the most memorable moments from the Celtics' fourth consecutive win captured in images below.