By MIKE CRANSTON
AP Sports Writer

CHARLOTTE, N.C.(AP) -- Ray Allen found his shooting touch, his
teammates scored at will inside and the Celtics made it look so
easy it was hard for Bobcats coach Larry Brown to watch.

Allen broke out of his shooting slump with 27 points, Kendrick
Perkins added 21 points and 12 rebounds and the Boston cruised
past Charlotte 108-90 on Tuesday night for their fifth straight
victory.

For a night, the Celtics looked like the dominant team that
started the season 6-0. And the Bobcats looked nothing like the
club that had won four straight, including a victory over
Cleveland.

"It was like the varsity against the JV," Brown said as he
attacked his team's effort and defense.

Entering shooting 30 percent from 3-point range, Allen took only
nine shots, but hit 5 of 6 3s, including one from behind the
plane of the backboard with 1 second left to give the Celtics a
62-39 halftime lead.

"Ray made shots early. When your shooter makes shots, the floor
opens a little bit more for you," Celtics coach Doc Rivers said.
"It opened up our low-post game."

Perkins took advantage, hitting 9 of 10 shots. Kevin Garnett
shot 5 for 8 and added 16 points and seven rebounds. About the
only negative was Rasheed Wallace's league-leading eighth
technical foul as the Celtics quickly ended any hopes Charlotte
had of erasing memories of its embarrassing 59-point performance
in Boston on opening night.

For Brown, who called a timeout less than 2 minutes in, this
game was worse.

"I'm happy for our fans. They got to go home and watch (North)
Carolina and Michigan State," Brown said. "If any of them were
smart, they would have left early and watched that game."

Gerald Wallace scored just five points for the Bobcats after
getting into early foul trouble. Nazr Mohammed had 16 points for
Charlotte, which entered giving up a league-low 87.9 points a
game.

Rivers entered the game worried about new Charlotte addition
Stephen Jackson, joking before the game that they were going to
"do some tic-tac-toe" to figure out if the 6-foot-5 Allen
guarded the 6-8 Jackson or 6-7 Wallace.

Allen started on Jackson, who immediately posted him and scored
in the lane on the first possession. But Wallace picked up two
fouls in 5 minutes and sat out the rest of the half, giving the
Celtics matchup advantages. Nobody could get a body on Perkins,
who was only five points shy of matching a career high.

"It was hard for me sitting in the first half, just watching
basically layup after layup after layup," said Wallace, who
entered as the reigning Eastern Conference player of the week
after twice topping 30 points in victories last week.

The Bobcats shot 31 percent in the first half without him, and
trailed by as many as 26 points before he got his first points
with 8:15 left in the third quarter.

But it might not have mattered with the Celtics shooting 55
percent and Allen finding his touch.

A career 40-percent shooter from behind the arc, Allen had gone
6 for 23 in the past four games. Rivers said at the shootaround
that he had said nothing to him and that "he hasn't forgot how"
to shoot.

With Perkins and Garnett drawing attention inside, Allen was
hitting from the outside and the foul line, where he made all 10
attempts. The Celtics didn't even need Paul Pierce (eight
points) to move into a tie for the Eastern Conference lead with
Orlando.

"I put some baby oil on the rim," Allen said, smiling. "I said
earlier I had to just put it in, just swish the ball, not even
mess around with the rim. It's really all a body thing, just
getting your legs in the air and being consistent."

It was a setback for the Bobcats, whose winning streak came at
the heels of a seven-game skid and included an impressive home
win over Cleveland Friday. They shot just 41 percent and trailed
by as many as 28 points.

"You could have taken five people from the stands and they'd
have run their stuff and I think it would have been just as
competitive," Brown said.

Added Gerald Wallace: "I think even Doc Rivers had 12 points."

NOTES: Rasheed Wallace is already halfway toward earning a
suspension for his technical foul count. "His teammates are on
him. We talked to him about it," Rivers said. "But at the end of
the day, he's going to have to solve that on his own. Rasheed
has a reputation, and he's earned it." ... Mohammed received a
technical for getting in Garnett's face after Garnett was called
for an offensive foul for hitting him in the face. ... The
Celtics held only their second morning shootaround of the
season, but it was because Rivers canceled practice Monday.