The Celtics travel to Philadelphia for their first game since the All-Star break hoping to continue their winning ways in the final 27 games of the regular season. The two teams had different stories before the break; the Celtics had won seven of their past eight games while the 76ers had lost seven of their past eight.

In the second, the Celtics needed a 26-point comeback to beat a Sixers team missing two of its top three players. The third was a much better representation of where the two Atlantic Division rivals sit in the current NBA hierarchy.