Kendrick Perkins admits that for a nanosecond he was the visiting heavy in the Garden last spring, when he hard-fouled Jae Crowder while setting a pick late in the Celtics’ Game 4 playoff loss to Cleveland.

“I try not to remember that,” Perkins, now a Pelican, said before his current team lost to his original team, 104-97, last night at the Garden.

But make no mistake about his admiration for Crowder.

“I think he’s the heart and soul of (the Celtics),” he said. “Guys feed off him. He brings that tenacity that you need. They have a nice team.

“They ballin’. They are a scary team to go against in the playoffs,” added Perkins. “You can feel they enjoy playing with each other. They play at a high level. They’ve got a lot of young talent. I watched when they beat Golden State and they were very impressive. I’ll tell you what — that Isaiah Thomas is playing at a high level right now. … Avery (Bradley) is playing at a high level. Probably one of the better defensive guards. (Jared Sullinger) is playing at a high level too.”

This one-time anchor of the Celtics defense, and member of the 2008 NBA champions, is particularly impressed by that part of their game.

“Shhh. They’ve got to be top five,” Perkins said. “You watch them — they’re not taking no possessions off, and the crazy thing is when they come in off the bench with Marcus Smart, Kelly Olynyk, they’re not losing anything. They remind me a little bit of the ’08 team in that they don’t want to disappoint their teammates. You can tell when one guy goes to help. It’s very impressive to watch.”

Painful look back

Evan Turner showed up for his off night in a Bruins sweater — the result of a jersey swap with David Pastrnak — and a red left eye. The Celtics forward has been told he’ll probably be able to play tomorrow night against Milwaukee after recovering from an eye poke by the Lakers’ Julius Randle last Sunday, but make no mistake about it.

Turner initially thought the injury was much worse.

“I don’t know anything about a scratch. I thought that bad boy came out,” Turner said. “I didn’t know, all I saw was black. So I was kind of freaking out. I thought of ‘Any Given Sunday,’ when his eye came out on the field. So I was saying, ‘No, damn, if I can’t see out my left eye that would suck.’ I’m glad it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.”

Though Turner appeared to run off the Staples Center floor toward the wrong locker room, he said, “I just ran off the court. I didn’t want to be on the ground whining. Does this hurt you? Yeah, I curled up the fetal position for like eight seconds and then I was like, ‘No, I can’t go out like this.’ If I’m going to cry out of my good eye it’s going to be in the back. That’s why I ran to the back, you know what I’m saying? That’s the biggest thing.”

Expect to see Turner in goggles tomorrow night, but don’t expect him to come out in a pair of those vintage Kareem Abdul-Jabbar goggles.

“No, not that. Not like that, either. I want it to be a little bit more nicer,” he said, also ruling out another famous, though vintage, NBA look. “Not the Kurt Rambis goggles, but find like MC Hammer-type of glasses.”

Durant hot topic

Perkins gave away little concerning good friend Kevin Durant’s free agency plans. Told the Thunder forward will be a Celtics target, Perkins said, “Boston and everybody else, right? But he never brought that up. I never, as a friend I try not to talk to him too much about free agency. I always try to just want to talk to him about things outside of basketball. We talk about personal life and stuff like that.

“And I know he’s getting this question every day on the hour and stuff like that, so I try not to bother him. But he did shoot some teams out there that he made me sign a confidentiality form that I couldn’t tell nobody. He’s got a few teams that he will be looking at.”a

Asked if he would be surprised if Durant chose the Celtics, Perkins attempted to deflect the question, saying, “You’re trying to get me to really answer the question. I can’t answer that. I want to, but I can’t. I mean, I don’t know. I do know but I don’t know.”

Perkins admitted he could see Durant staying in Oklahoma City under certain conditions.

“It’s a possibility. I think it all (depends) on what happens in these playoffs,” he said. “They win it all, he can’t leave in my opinion. But if they don’t, it might be time for a change.”

The 31-year-old Perkins initially said he wanted to play until he turned 35, but then got down to the truth.

“I was just joking about retiring in three years,” he said. “I’m going to go to my agent and he’ll tell me he doesn’t have any more job offers for me. They are going to have to kick me out of the league. No way I’m going to just retire and leave this great job. We’ll see.”

Friendly neighbors

Turner had to be told that hockey jerseys are called sweaters.

“A sweater? Cool, well it’s free . . . so,” said Turner, who has also swapped jerseys with the Revolution’s Charlie Davies, and has a budding friendship with Pastrnak.

“We actually went out a little bit,” he said. “He gets after it. He’s a cool dude. We were neighbors for a little bit. We lived in the same building in Cambridge. So he’s a cool dude and he’s telling me about the last few games of the season being very important. So hopefully they make the playoffs and I can come check them out.”