April 02, 2022
The Sixers demolished the Hornets in a Saturday matinee, outpacing Charlotte 144-114 in a game that got out of hand quickly in the second half.
Here's what I saw.
• The Sixers could have shown up to a Saturday matinee with the usual level of juice an early April game against the Hornets demands, which is to say very little. But after a horrible loss in Detroit on Thursday night, they could hardly afford to throw another game away as they prepare for the playoffs. So everyone who showed up to celebrate their mascot's birthday (yes, this was a thing) actually got to watch some decent basketball, which was a change of pace after the Pistons debacle.
Philadelphia's offense was almost exclusively pick-and-roll basketball in the early stages of this game, Joel Embiid and James Harden featuring prominently in basically every possession in the first quarter. Charlotte tried to show some different looks at Harden as the ball-handler, though it didn't really matter whether Mason Plumlee sat in drop coverage or showed higher against Philly's lead ball-handler. Harden was dropping pocket pass after pocket pass into Embiid on the roll, and when that wasn't there because of Charlotte shrinking the floor, he made finding corner shooters look remarkably easy.
He was not alone in the playmaking department, with Embiid embracing the opportunity to create for others out of the short roll instead of always hunting his own shots. That led to some pretty offensive possessions, including one possession late in the first where he caught a Harden entry and then immediately one-handed the ball to Georges Niang underneath the basket, picking up a quick and easy two.
It wasn't so long ago now that "Joel Embiid doesn't like to roll/Joel Embiid isn't good at rolling" was a prominent storyline for this team. And in fairness, he has basically said himself that being a more active roller equated to sacrificing for the good of the team. Being the roll half of the pick-and-roll has been to the good of Embiid specifically, though, and Harden hasn't needed him to be a high-flying target in order to set him up for a ton of easy buckets.
When Embiid is rolling downhill, there aren't a lot of guys who are interested in standing between him and the rim. Even when the Hornets made attempts to draw charges and put a barrier between the big man and the bucket, he used Euro steps and long, sweeping moves in order to get to the rim mostly unchallenged, depositing layups and drawing fouls in the process. Embiid having a monster first half used to rely on him creating a lot of his own points from basically nothing, and he managed to walk into halftime on Saturday afternoon with a 19/11/4 line and very little heavy lifting involved.
Even when he didn't have the looks spoon-fed, the Hornets were drawing dead trying to stop No. 21. When Mason Plumlee is your best option against an MVP candidate, you're going to have a very bad time at the office.
• Perhaps James Harden was onto something by focusing more on playmaking when he first got here instead of being the switch-hunting, high-scoring dynamo he used to be in Houston. The Sixers absolutely need Harden to be an attacker, that much is clear, but they mostly need him to play and act decisively instead of wasting the first 18 seconds of the shot clock simply hanging around the perimeter.
He did a much better job of that against Charlotte, even when they switched some actions involving Harden at the top of the key. In those instances, it was rare to see Harden spending much time sizing up the guy in front of him. Sometimes that meant getting another screen, sometimes it meant immediately giving the ball to Embiid against a smaller defender, sometimes it meant swinging it elsewhere for a better angle to get the entry into their big man. Whatever was necessary, Harden and the supporting cast made sure it happened.
The passes Harden was making against coverages of all types looked a lot easier than they actually are for most players. Making quick decisions didn't always come off for Harden, who coughed away some ugly turnovers like the rest of his teammates did against Charlotte, but trusting the early read was to their benefit more often than not, leading to either a clean look or forcing rotations that left the Hornets scrambling as Philly moved the ball around the perimeter.
Doc Rivers has stressed the need for Harden and the rest of the Sixers to play with more pace, and he has good reason to emphasize it. Whenever Harden makes an effort to get the Sixers into their offense early, they look noticeably better as a unit, with Harden simplifying everyone's roles while still keeping them connected as a unit. Isolation possessions here and there are justified, but it's on Harden to tie everything and keep the group in a rhythm, lest they end up in a spot where everyone is ice cold when they're needed in the second half.
When his individual effectiveness isn't there, he can still leave a giant mark on the game, and he did that against Charlotte.
• Tobias Harris had a decent case (albeit a losing case) as Philadelphia's best offensive player for much of the first half on Saturday, finding success as a piece of the Harden/Embiid pick-and-roll machine and as a primary creative force when the Sixers' two lead stars were on the bench. He has been blending the best of both worlds recently, taking and making catch-and-shoot threes while getting a small but steady diet of touches from his favored spots in the mid-post.
The expectation for Harris to carry the second unit has diminished in this new-look Sixers team, but some of the best stretches they've had without all their starters on the floor have come with Harris simply killing teams. He was in complete control of the offense when Embiid and Harden sat in this game, scoring every which way against Hornets forward Miles Bridges. With the Hornets feeling the pressure, Harris started to see a bit of extra pressure from Charlotte, and he used the attention to play set up man.
Hell, Harris even made DeAndre Jordan look closer to his former self in this game, and those two look relatively in sync in spite of their limited time on the floor together. He may not be leading the way in assists to Jordan since he joined the rotation, but he's definitely up there, with Harris doing a nice job of putting lobs in Jordan's catch radius when the two are put together in an action. That used to be a much easier feat, and Harris is serving up Jordan with at least one easy scoring opportunity per game when he comes downhill.
With the Sixers in need of some "old school load management" with a back-to-back looming, Harris was the guy who ultimately put the game away to open the fourth quarter, flashing the skill and confidence he has had a surplus of lately. Seeing Harris step confidently into threes is a wonderful sight for this group, and it was a big part of them pulling away from the young Hornets.
• It probably shouldn't have taken me this long to get to Tyrese Maxey, but look, this was a dominant performance from the Sixers, which pushes his effort a bit further down than it would usually be. The offense was absolutely humming, and that left Maxey in a spot where he didn't have to do a whole lot of anything at times. Sometimes, that means they're screwing up and need to get him the ball, but Saturday it's because their route one offense was so dominant that his services weren't always needed.
When called upon, Maxey was his typically excellent self, pulling off a few nasty step-through moves to get to the rim in addition to pull-up threes that helped turn this game into a second-half laugher.
There have been some recent calls to move Maxey to the bench to deal with the scoring issues they have with the second unit, but I simply don't get the philosophy behind it. Maxey is still leading the bench from the guard spot in the current configuration, and all you'd be doing is playing one of your best guys fewer minutes for no real reason.
• Matisse Thybulle was a relative non-factor for the first half or so of this game, but he gave the Sixers (and this game) a needed jolt of energy to help break this game wide open. Seeing a pair of threes go down appeared to be all he needed to get rolling, and he was an absolute menace on defense in the third quarter against Charlotte.
He had a bit of help from his teammates, whose attention to detail and positioning helped empower Thybulle to gamble in passing lanes and get active. Tyrese Maxey, whose defensive weaknesses have been put on full display recently, was one of a few guys who did a nice job stunting and collapsing off-ball to put Hornets players in the middle of congestion. Embiid's off-ball activity was considerably better than the previous game, the big man deflecting some weak passes thrown in his direction.
But Thybulle was the dose of chaos they ultimately needed to turn them over, and he inspired an ovation with his effort in the third. Thybulle's energy was so infectious that the officials got swept up in the moment, giving the Sixers a favorable ruling when Thybulle's hustle led to him throwing a the ball off of himself before it fell out of bounds.
• James Harden shooting two consecutive catch-and-shoot threes on the same possession qualifies as a victory, especially after he made the second attempt. There were some record-scratch moments for Harden and the offense in general, but a noticeable uptick in willingness all the same.
• The Sixers are not going to play and shoot that well very often, because nobody is good enough to manage that, so savor this moment.
• The Hornets are not a good defensive team, but they are not a passive defensive team. They like to gamble and get into passing lanes, and if you give them opportunities to turn you over, they'll take them and run.
To put it lightly, the Sixers gave them plenty of chances to get out and run, turning the ball over 10 times in the first 16 minutes of the game. The pace slowed toward the end of the first half, but going into the half with 12 turnovers is the sort of thing the Process Sixers used to do regularly, and they had the excuse of employing guards who were often barely justified having NBA contracts (and in some cases, not justified).
There's nobody to spotlight specifically here because the entire roster contributed to the problem, even when they weren't ultimately responsible for the turnover entered into the box score. Good passes bounced off of guys hands, miscommunications happened all over the floor, and they were careless with the basketball. They were so good on offense otherwise that it ultimately didn't matter, but just imagine how big of a blowout this might have been if not for the giveaways.
• I would take a stream of 12:30 p.m. matinee games in perpetuity, thank you very much. Getting out of the arena with the sun still out and the night ahead of you is a beautiful thing.
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