By Adam Lucas

BOSTON—Larry Bird once shot 4-for-17 from the field in a game.

The Celtics being the Celtics, they won that game anyway, beating the then-San Diego Clippers 88-85. Those Boston teams were more than just Bird; even then, in 1981 they had Robert Parish scoring 16 points and Kevin McHale adding 14.

But when those Celtics teams all played at peak performance, oh, it was beautiful basketball. It was, for example, Game 6 of the 1986 NBA Finals, when Bird posted a triple-double, but McHale also contributed 19 points and Danny Ainge scored 19 and Dennis Johnson had three steals and Parish grabbed 11 boards.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what you saw at TD Garden on Friday night.

In just the fourth night of the Free the Machine tour, everything clicked. No less an authority than Driver Williams had predicted this one night earlier. Standing outside the Xfinity Mobile Arena after Thursday evening’s show in Philadelphia, he was openly happy with the performance…but promised there was even more to come. “It’s coming together,” he said of a tour that was just three days old. “It feels like we’ve got it.”

Twenty-four hours later, they showed it. Don’t underestimate how hard this is to do. Philadelphia to Boston is one of the longest hauls on this segment of the tour, over six hours on a bus factoring in traffic and construction. And that bus ride is only after a complicated load out, with a stage manager playing through a torn meniscus.

And by 10 a.m., they were in Boston and setting up to do it all over again, on a tight timeline after arriving later than expected. So the entire crew could have been forgiven if Friday night was just a little bit off.

Take your excuses and stick that in your country song.

With Church leading the way, Friday instead turned into a prime example of near perfection. And for Chief, it couldn’t have come in a better place.

“I was born in 1977,” he told the crowd. “And growing up in the 80s, you were either a Celtics or Lakers guy. I was a Larry Joe Bird guy.”

This had the predictable effect on the packed crowd. But then Church took it even further and proceeded to document just how legitimate his Celtics fandom had been. “From Cousy, Havlicek and Russell, to my team, which had Dennis Johnson, Robert Parish and Larry Joe Bird, all the way to Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce,” he said. “Did I leave anyone out? Oh, my team was coached by K.C. Jones.”

Having touched on virtually every era of Celtics greatness, playing beneath the franchise’s 18 world championship banners, Church smirked. This wasn’t just some guy pandering to the home crowd. This was authentic fandom. “See?” he said. “You motherfuckers didn’t think I could do that.”

And then he continued in the only possible way. By leaning into the microphone and barking, “Turn the quiet up,” as he roared into “Smoke a Little Smoke.”

But the night wasn’t just about Bird…er, Church. This was a show when John Henry Trinko’s piano intro to “Mistress Named Music” seemed to help the evening take flight. Lee Hendricks’ bass on “The Outsiders” was fantastic. Williams’ guitar solo on “Creepin’” was so good Church walked away and had time to take a drink to enjoy it a little more. Jeff Cease opened “Cold One” with a flourish, Jeff Hyde made the tender “Some Of It” a highlight on a night that was otherwise a hard-rocking show and Craig Wright was a centerpiece on drums for the entire evening.

Put all of it together and these are the notes you find written in your notebook over the course of the night:

Best “Darkest Hour” of the tour so far.

Best “Hometown” of the tour so far.

Best “Springsteen” of the tour so far.

Best “Talladega” of the tour so far.

You get the idea.

It was made even better by a setlist that was the perfect mixture of tempos. Two songs made their Free the Machine tour debut—“Chattanooga Lucy” and “Old Friends, Old Whiskey, Old Songs.”

And the crowd, which stood for almost the entire show, made it even better. We should have listened to veteran production manager Meesha Kosciolek (who had a great recent “Insiders Hour” on Outsiders Radio). Walking through the stands 15 minutes before the show, he said, “There’s good energy in here tonight.”

He was right. And it was exactly the kind of energy that makes Church thrive. Here’s a tip: when the Ray-Bans come off early in the show, he’s connected with the crowd. On Friday he lifted his sunglasses less than halfway into the setlist, standing with arms outstretched and Ray-Bans raised after the rousing sing-along to the entirety of “Hometown.”

So it wasn’t a surprise that by the time the show was supposed to end, he wasn’t ready to go. At the end of “Round Here Buzz,” he deviated from the setlist. “MJ, let me have this guitar,” he said to ace guitar tech MJ Sagraves. “I’m going off script.”

Sagraves has worked with Church long enough that he probably expected the curveball. He simply stood on the side of the stage and raised the would-be replacement guitar above his head, egging Church on with the rest of the crowd. That allowed Chief to play two completely unplanned songs, “Old Friends” and “These Boots.” He still wasn’t satisfied. “I’m going to do one more by myself,” he said. “Shit, I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

He did “Sinners Like Me,” once again reminding everyone in attendance that they came to all hail rock and roll, but they also came to watch him paint with his old Gibson.

Boston had been waiting since the Double Down appearance in 2019 for a Church revival. So he wanted to make sure they got a good one, playing later than any other show on the tour.

In the end, it was just one of those nights when everything works. Church ad libbed the perfect description of the night during “Round Here Buzz.”

“I never thought I’d play in Boston

Growing up a Celtics fan

I can tell you tonight has been more than awesome.”