Gary Washburn of the Boston Globe reports:

When Dwight Howard crunched Rajon Rondo to the floor with 32.7 seconds left in the first quarter, and Rondo needed a break to begin the second, Nate Robinson came on with his best stretch of basketball as a Celtic. He gave Rondo the relief he has needed for the entire postseason.

In 8 minutes 46 seconds, Robinson scored 13 points, and added an assist, a steal, and strong defense on Jameer Nelson and Jason Williams.

The Celtics have lacked a backup point guard and when they desperately needed to give Rondo a break, Robinson pushed all of his habits aside and produced.

“Nate Robinson was huge in the first half,’’ Orlando coach Stan Van Gundy said. “I mean, that was a huge, huge lift for them to have [13] points in the first half. This is a guy who scored a lot of points in New York.

“I think what he did tonight was probably what they had in mind when they made the deal [with the Knicks]. I guess for whatever reason he hadn’t played much for them, but in an absolutely huge game, he stepped up and played great tonight.’’