Celtics pull away to beat 0-11 Sixers

Philadelphia, PA (SportsNetwork.com) - Brandon Bass and Jared Sullinger combined for 55 points, Rajon Rondo had 13 assists and the Boston Celtics pulled away for a 101-90 win Wednesday night that kept the Philadelphia 76ers winless.

Bass scored 23 off the bench, Sullinger added 22 with nine rebounds and Marcus Thornton had 13 points for the Celtics, who snapped a three-game losing streak.

Tony Wroten scored 21 points off the bench to lead the Sixers, who returned home from an 0-4 road trip and fell to 0-11 on the season.

Henry Sims added 14 points in the loss, Luc Mbah a Moute and Michael Carter- Williams scored 11 apiece and Nerlens Noel had 10.

The Sixers won three of the four meetings between the Atlantic Division rivals last season and were in line to make a run at their first win before Boston pulled away in the second half.

The Celtics outshot the Sixers 52.5 percent to 37.5 percent in the third and fourth quarters after the score was tied 46-46 at halftime.

The Sixers, who entered play losing by an average of 16.9 points per game, are four losses from matching the 1972-73 team for the worst start in franchise history.

Noel said they lost energy in the second half.

"We didn't communicate as much on defense and they got some open shots," he said. "Rondo does a great job running that team."

Rondo had six assists in the third quarter, including an alley-oop to Jeff Green for a dunk during a 9-0 Celtics run that turned a two-point deficit into a seven-point lead.

Avery Bradley capped the spurt with a 3-pointer and Boston led by as many as eight before Wroten's 3 pulled the Sixers within 73-68 going into the fourth.

Carter-Williams, making his first start of the season, scored seven straight Philadelphia points after Boston built an 11-point lead early in the fourth, but the Sixers never got closer than five in the last 12 minutes.

Sullinger's 3 and another alley-oop dunk by Green extended Boston's lead to 15 with 1:33 left.

"We just played faster (in the second half)," said Sullinger. "Coach challenged us at halftime to play harder, faster, smarter and that's what we did."

Mbah a Moute's 3 sparked a 9-0 run in the first quarter that gave the Sixers an eight-point lead. They went up by nine in the second, but Thornton scored five points during a 15-4 Celtics flurry that gave the visitors the lead.

Game Notes

The Celtics will go from playing the worst team in the NBA to the best when they face the league-leading Grizzlies in Memphis on Friday ... The Sixers remain in Philadelphia to face Phoenix on Friday ... Bass came within four points of tying his career high of 27 set Dec. 3, 2010, for Orlando against Detroit. Four Magic players missed that game because of a stomach virus, including Dwight Howard.