Boston’s Paul Pierce drives past Detroit’s Tayshaun Prince in first-half action last night at the TD Banknorth Garden.

The Providence Journal / Kris Craig

BOSTON — If any team can shake off a sub-par Game One effort in a playoff series, it’s the Detroit Pistons.

A few minutes after his team had been dispatched by the Celtics by an 88-79 count last night, veteran big man Rasheed Wallace didn’t seem to have a care in the world.

“We’re all right. Hats off to them,” Wallace said. “They played a good game, they got Game One, but there’s a Game Two in a couple of days. There’s nobody in this joint nervous.”

The Pistons did not play well in the Eastern Conference finals opener, especially their stars. Wallace miss eight of his 12 shots and finished with 11 points. Point guard Chauncey Billups was worse. He looked slow and bothered by his injured hamstring and checked in with a very quiet nine points and two assists.

Boston’s stars, meanwhile, showed up big-time. Kevin Garnett twisted and turned his way to an array of jump shots that resulted in 11-for-17 shooting and a game-high 26 points. Paul Pierce didn’t connect much from long-distance, but his jumpers and slashes to the rim added up to 22 points.

Garnett and Pierce weren’t alone. The wildly inconsistent Rajon Rondo (11 points, 7 assists, 5 steals) was back on his game as he dominated with his quickness. Kendrick Perkins also helped out with his 10 rebounds and defense against Wallace.

Tayshaun Prince led the Pistons with 16 points and Richard Hamilton added 15, 12 in the second half. All of the Pistons had trouble dealing with Garnett, who averaged 24 points against Detroit this season.

“We wanted to establish Kevin. We know the success he’s had against Detroit,” said Pierce. “We feel like Kevin has an advantage almost every night, especially one-on-one or on the block.”

While the Pistons clearly showed plenty of rust from their one-week playoff layoff, the Celtics rebounded nicely from their Game Seven win over Cleveland on Sunday. The Celtics shot out to an 8-0 lead and led, 22-17, after one quarter. The Pistons regrouped and grabbed the lead in the second quarter but Boston rallied and led, 41-40, at the break.

The key stretch of the game came in the third quarter. A heavy dose of Garnett and Pierce, who combined for 17 points, led to a 69-57 lead entering the fourth quarter. The Celtics evened up a big Detroit free-throw advantage in the quarter by knocking in 11 freebies to only one for the Pistons, and their defense forced seven of the visitors’ 13 turnovers.

But the Pistons are one team no one can count out. Their veteran experience can be downright scary, and several players own explosive offensive skills.

“There’s two teams left like that — Detroit and San Antonio,” said Doc Rivers. “They’ve been there so many games, came back so many times. Two minutes left, up 10, and I was completely worried about the game. They’re just a smart basketball team. That’s what we have to deal with.”

Billups and Wallace played their best in the fourth quarter and helped make Rivers and the sellout crowd sweat. Boston’s lead was down to 79-73 with four minutes left, but the Celts responded with Pierce dropping in a wing jumper and Rondo canning a clutch baseline jumper to boost the lead back up to 83-73 with 2:40 left. When Rondo swished a rare 3-pointer at the 1:49 mark for an 86-75 lead, the Pistons were done for good.

“Whenever you play so many games in the playoffs, you learn so much about yourselves,” said Pierce. “We’re the only team in the league that’s played 14 games, so we’ve learned a lot. This team has learned to keep its composure, especially when the lead is broken down. I thought we did a great job of moving the ball when Detroit started to make a run.”

Detroit coach Flip Saunders agreed that his team was only in the flow of the game for some infrequent spurts. The layoff is one potential answer.

“We just didn’t seem to be in a good flow,” Saunders said. “They may have something to do with that. I told our guys that as bad as we played, we had opportunities. In the third quarter, we had six or seven turnovers which basically blew the game open. We had trouble recovering from that.”

kmcnamar@projo.com