The Boston Celtics rolled to a dominant 130-94 win over the Charlotte Hornets on Friday night at TD Garden, reaching 60 victories for the second consecutive season.
Payton Pritchard paced the Celtics with 22 points off the bench on 9-of-11 shooting, including four makes from beyond the arc.
Sam Hauser added 20 points and drained six triples, helping Boston improve to 60-21 with one game left on the regular-season schedule.
Derrick White tallied 19 points and seven assists, while Jayson Tatum contributed 16 points, eight boards and eight assists in just under 32 minutes.
Al Horford posted a double-double with 13 points and 11 rebounds, as head coach Joe Mazzulla rested most starters for the entire fourth quarter.
Boston used a 37-point third quarter to blow the game open, stretching a narrow one-point halftime lead into a 91-75 advantage entering the final period.
The Celtics knocked down 23 three-pointers at a 45.1% clip, continuing their league-leading perimeter production.
Charlotte, which dropped to 19-62 on the season, was led by Seth Curry’s 17 points off the bench. Curry went 5-of-7 from long range.
Nick Smith Jr. added nine points and four assists, and Mark Williams had 10 points and 12 rebounds for the Hornets, who were without LaMelo Ball, Miles Bridges and Brandon Miller due to injuries.
Jaylen Brown missed the game with right knee soreness, an injury that has lingered over the past month and made him ineligible for postseason award consideration due to the league’s minimum games requirement.
Charlotte, which has now lost seven of its last eight, remained locked into the bottom two of the Eastern Conference and will finish the season out of the playoff picture for the eighth straight year.
Boston has now won eight of its last 10 and will look to head into the playoffs healthy and rested.
