Celtics center Nikola Vucevic (left) played in his first game against his former team after being traded by the Bulls last week.
Celtics center Nikola Vucevic (left) played in his first game against his former team after being traded by the Bulls last week.Erin Clark/Globe Staff
The final game before the All-Star break is no more meaningful than those that preceded it. But it is followed by a week off, so a comfortable win can make the respite more relaxing, while an ugly loss can fester.
The Celtics took the former option Wednesday, as they seized control quickly and rolled to a 124-105 win over the Bulls that was never in doubt.
Payton Pritchard had 26 points and 8 assists to lead Boston, Jaylen Brown scored 24 points in just 29 minutes, and Nikola Vucevic had 19 points and 11 rebounds against the team that traded him to the Celtics last week.
The Celtics, who bounced back from Sunday’s blowout loss to the Knicks, shot 51.6 percent from the field and made 18 of 45 3-pointers. Rob Dillingham had 16 points to lead the Bulls.
Just one week after the Celtics traded Anfernee Simons to the Bulls for Vucevic, both players faced their former teams Wednesday. Simons, who embraced his sixth-man role in Boston and was eager for the first playoff run of his career, received a warm ovation when he was introduced in the starting lineup.
He then quickly provided a reminder of the offensive pop Boston lost. In the opening minutes the guard hit an off-balance catch-and-shoot baseline jumper before pouring in a 3-pointer. But he mustered just two more points over the next two quarters.
The Bulls took an early 16-11 lead, but their night turned sour shortly after that.
The Celtics’ surge began when Brown was joined by an all-bench group that included Vucevic, Pritchard, Hugo Gonzalez, and Ron Harper Jr. Boston trailed, 23-22, when it uncorked a quick 9-0 run that included a three-minute Chicago drought.
The Celtics hit their last five shots of the opening quarter and finished it 14 for 25 from the field and 6 for 11 from the 3-point line, giving them a 36-27 lead. It seemed problematic for Chicago that it trailed by a wide margin despite making half of its shots.
The Celtics turned up their defensive pressure in the second half, and the game quickly got out of reach.
Jordan Walsh took the ball from Simons and raced in for a dunk that made it 40-27, and two 3-pointers by Sam Hauser stretched it to a 32-8 run and gave the Celtics a 54-31 lead. Vucevic had a strong second quarter against his former team.
During one sequence, he drilled a 3 from the top of the key before chasing down an offensive rebound and finding a cutting Walsh for a 3-point play. The Celtics took a 72-44 halftime lead after shooting 58.3 percent from the field and 52.6 percent from the 3-point line. Pritchard was 7 for 8 overall.
The teams played the third quarter evenly, but that is a fine path when you have a 28-point lead, as the Celtics did.
Adam Himmelsbach can be reached at adam.himmelsbach@globe.com. Follow him @adamhimmelsbach.