LOS ANGELES — Say this much, you can’t pin this loss on officiating.

The problem was – with the Celtics on Tuesday night – they said all the right things after the game but did precious few of them during an 89-67 loss to the Lakers in Game 6 of the 2010 NBA finals at Staples Center.

“We got our ass kicked, point-blank, simple. They came out there and hit us hard. They beat us mentally, physically,” Glen Davis said.

Getting outrebounded, 30-13, in the first half of a game you could have won the NBA title with is never a good sign. Yes, they lost Kendrick Perkins to a sprained right knee midway through the first quarter to a terrible bad bit of luck. But even before that, there were signs that the Lakers were beat the Celtics at their own game – energy.

“They did a great job,” Davis said. “They were the better team today. We didn’t come out and establish the tempo and we didn’t come out there hit them back. We didn’t do that at all. We didn’t play Celtics basketball.”

So can Davis and company change it for Thursday?

“I don’t know,” he admitted. “I have no idea. But we better find something, make it happen.”

Pierce – as you would expect from a captain – was far more confident.

“I’ll tell you one thing, when I’m standing here on Thursday night, we won’t be talking about [lack of] energy,” Pierce said.

Still, it’s fairly mind-boggling that the Celtics had such trouble mustering up enough energy to compete with the Lakers, who were facing elimination for the first time in this playoff season.

“We have no choice,” Garnett said. “We come out [in Game 7] with the energy we had tonight, we’ll get blown out, embarrassed.”