Philadelphia 76ers took the court of the Wells Fargo Center on Tuesday night to face the Phoenix Suns. Phoenix came to Philadelphia as the team with the best record in the NBA and the best record since New Year’s Eve.
While the Sixers had the opportunity to take a 14-point lead against the league leading Suns, they eventually could not hold to the win due to poor shooting and bad decisions during the fourth quarter.
“A lot of plays added to the reason why we weren’t able to win tonight’s game. So, we’ve gotta figure out ways to be a little more organized in the fourth. They went zone and it kind of impacted us and got us away from getting good looks that we were getting throughout the game,” Tobias Harris said in the post-game presser.
Harris went to score 30 points for the 76ers. That was the fifth time this season Harris had a 30-point game, however, his efforts were not enough for his team against the Suns, who are formidably good at closing out games.
Even on a poor shooting night from beyond the arc (23.1 percent), Phoenix dictated the tempo and found effective offensive plays as Chris Paul, Devin Booker and Mikal Bridges combined for 64 points. The Suns ended up winning 114-109 in Philadelphia.
The Sixers allowed many second chance points, had several bad turnovers in the second half, and had a poor shooting performance once the Suns went into zone defense.
“We made a few adjustments on defense just to go to the zone. Kind of take them out of the post-ups with Jo [Joel Embiid]. Whether or not that won us the game it’s hard to say but it did give us a chance to break his rhythm a little bit,” Suns’ head coach Monty Williams said on the last eight minutes of the game.
Joel Embiid was once again unstoppable. He notched his 21st consecutive game of at least 25 points, which stands as the second-longest in franchise history behind Hall of Famer Allen Iverson’s 27-game streak, according to StatHead. He ended up with 34 points, 12 rebounds and three assists to go with three steals. However, he and Harris had two crucial turnovers in the closing minutes of the game.
“We didn’t execute. On the turnover, I saw him [Seth Curry] running and tried to throw the ball so he could catch it on the run. Tried to catch the defense off guard and he just slowed down just a bit, which kind of made the bad pass. But, overall we just didn’t execute in the fourth quarter. Especially, we had a bunch of situations where we had to take bad shots because the clock was running down. So, we’ve got to do a better job,” Joel Embiid noted.
The 76ers shot just 40 percent from the field and 30 percent from deep during the fourth quarter. Many of Doc Rivers’ team came at the end of the shot clock including several long threes under extensive defensive pressure.
“And the last thing from us, I just didn’t like, I thought we got really stagnant offensively. We just went to Joel [Embiid] and stood still. We’ve got to have better continuity down the stretch. And we all know that. I think they all know that. It is what it is,” Doc River noted in the post game presser.
After their 114-109 loss, Philadelphia dropped to 32-22. The 76ers remain in the fifth spot of the Eastern Conference standings. On the other side, the Suns accumulate their 44th victory of the season to remain at the top of the Western Conference standings.
