Heading into tonight, I was going try and write a full game recap… and I just couldn’t do it. Hopefully you guys forgive me — Josh Harris and Brett Brown both talked before the game and said interestingish things (plus the players hung around in the locker room for a while to talk, and I got some good stuff from them), so there will some solid Sixers #content to hold you over for the rest of the week —but when I saw both teams’ starters, it became impossible to break down the game with a straight face:
Although, you should expect a detailed video breakdown of Joel Embiid’s ATO after the game:
I wrote about the game’s stakes today, and both teams didn’t disappoint in the tanking department. Besides a seven-minute run for Udonis Haslem in the second quarter, Erik Spoelstra played his five worst players for the entire game! And they still won! The Heat played a healthy amount of zone defense to compensate for the nonexistent amount of rest their players received.
According to Basketball Reference, the only other team that had four players log the full 48 minutes in the last 30 years was the 2009-10 Golden State Warriors (Steph Curry, Anthony Tolliver, Reggie Williams, Monta Ellis).
Henry “Don’t Call Me Bill” Walker hit the game-winning 3-pointer in the final minute to steal JaKarr Sampson’s thunder, and the Heat won, 105-101. This was obviously a really, really bad game overall (as expected). Besides that, I don’t have much else. For Miami, Michael Beasley scored 34 points on 27 shots, which just about sums up what type of game it was. What a spectacle.
Most importantly, Brooklyn used a strong fourth quarter to beat Orlando, 101-88. The Heat will have the 10th spot in the lottery, and a 91 percent chance of retaining their pick this season. Tonight, Miami won the battle and the war.
That just about does it for the Sixers’ season. Like last year, it should be pretty interesting to see what the front office has in store. Brett Brown didn’t seem too keen on going through another season like this before the game, so we’ll see what happens there.
