The other night the Celtics were lamenting how much further they had to go before they could say that they had played a complete game. The offense was a step or two behind the defense, they said, and not yet operating at peak efficiency.

Perfection may be a Quixotic notion for the Celtics, or any other basketball team, but on Friday night in a 118-90 win against a Chicago Bulls team that pushed them to their absolute physical and mental limits in the playoffs last season they played about as close to perfect as anyone has a right to expect.

The numbers were simply staggering:

* The Bulls shot 29 percent in the first half and scored just 35 points.

* The Celtics opened the second half making six straight 3-pointers to open up a lead that reached 31 points.

* On their 43 successful field goal attempts, the Celtics racked up 33 assists.

Now, the Bulls of October are not the Bulls of last April and the Celtics are a far cry from the walking MASH unit they rolled out on the floor last spring, but on this night the guys in green looked every bit like the best team in the league.

Here are three more things we learned:

RAJON RONDO IS MAKING A NAME

The Celtics opened the game making five of their first six shots and Rondo had assists on each and every one of them. With the basketball world hoping for a rematch of the sensational Rondo-Derrick Rose battle from last spring, the Celtics point guard simply went out and played.

Call it maturity. Call it recognition. Call it whatever you want, Rondo took just two shots, and he was still the most important on the floor. He finished with 16 assists and just two turnovers and he has racked up a whopping 37 assists against just seven turnovers on the young season.

“They asked me [on television] that Rondo had only two shots attempts and I said, ‘Yeah, but he’s the most dominant player on the floor right now,’” Doc Rivers said. “I thought he controlled the game with his speed. He did it with less dribbles tonight, and that’s what we want him to do. I thought he had a fantastic game.”

If they tracked assists like they do in hockey, the Celtics would have had close to 60 of them. Every possession seemed to end with bang-bang passes for easy layups and open jumpers.

“With the talent we have on our team, not only do we have great talent, they’re unselfish,” Rondo said. “From the bigs to the guards. KG is one of the best passers in the game for a big. It’s contagious when one guy is passing the ball we all pass the ball.”

But it was Rondo who set the tone by getting them into the offense quickly and efficiently. “I never felt like he had the ball,” Ray Allen said. “We were passing so much. No one held on to the ball.”

What made Rondo’s performance even more staggering was that the opportunity was there for him to try to take center stage on national television, and yet he didn’t let the moment get in the way of the task at hand.

“Rondo gets up now for every game,” Rivers said. “There was a time, even last year, where he kind of picked and chose. If it was Rose, he’d be really up. He’s just playing now. He’s not, ‘Oh tonight I have Rose.’ It doesn’t matter the opponent.”

Rondo has now thoroughly deconstructed Cleveland’s Mo Williams, who was chosen for the All-Star team over him. He has taken apart Charlotte’s tandem of Ray Felton and D.J. Augustin, who gave the Celtics fits last season, and he dismantled Rose, who, to be fair, is dealing with an injured ankle. He is reaching the point, as Rivers suggested earlier in the week, where he has gone from the hunter to the hunted.  

“I still feel that I’ve got a lot to prove to myself, regardless of whether guys are trying to make a name off me,” Rondo said. “I’ve got four guys behind me [on the court] and another 12-15 behind that. I play for my team.”

THE BENCH COMES THROUGH; AGAIN

Speaking of making a name, little by little the second unit is continuing to make its mark. They added another line to their resume in the first quarter when foul trouble sent Kendrick Perkins, Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett to the bench. The lead was 15-13 and by the time the starters came back on the floor it had grown to 37-24.

“They’re coming in and if they’re not sustaining the lead, stretching it out,” Garnett said. “I can’t even say anymore, man. It’s a luxury to have these guys right now. It’s so beneficial for the first group. It takes so much pressure off others.”

Up and down the line the second unit did their thing. Eddie House ripped off 22 points on 9-for-13 shooting. Shelden Williams recorded a double-double with 10 points and 10 boards. Marquis Daniels had a tidy line of seven points, four rebounds and four assists.

Then there was Rasheed Wallace who made just two of the nine shots he took, but soaked up 25 minutes and was instrumental in opening the floor and setting screens.

“We were just playing, playing our game and getting open shots and just taking them all,” House said. “Actually, my shot wasn’t feeling too good early on and then all of a sudden, you know, I knocked in a couple of intermediate shots and the three’s started dropping.”

Rivers talked after the game about just keeping things simple. “You don’t have to complicate it sometimes if you have the floor space,” he said.

Simple and predictable. Such a nice change from last season.

THE DEFENSE DOESN’T REST

On a night when the Celtics shot 58 percent and put up 68 points in the second half alone, there wasn’t a lot of attention paid to the other end of the floor. The end where they have made their reputation and where they feel they are the best team in the league. Yes, we’re talking about defense.

“We take a lot of pride in that,” Daniels said. “We want to be the best defensive team ever in the NBA. We were putting them on the line a lot, but aside from that I think our defense was pretty good.”

Pretty good doesn’t even begin to describe it. They defended the perimeter – Luol Deng and John Salmons were a combined 4-for-22 and the Bulls shot just 2-for-15 from the 3-point line. They completely took away Chicago’s inside game in the first half, holding the Bulls to just eight points in the paint.

So when the three’s started falling and Rondo started running the break to perfection things quickly got out of hand in the second half. But in reality it was over long before that and it all started on the defensive end.

“Our defense,” Rivers said, “will always carry us.”