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THE SCORE OF THE BOX
The absence of Joel Embiid is certainly felt on Saturday.
Without the All-Star Center, the Sixers were beaten by the glass and on the scoreboard during a 130-115 loss to the Blazers in the morning at Wells Fargo Center.
This one was not pretty. The sold-out crowd began to clear their places with just over five minutes to go in the third.
The defeat brings the Sixers to 24-8 at home and 38-22 in general.
Here are the observations of the loss.
• The defense – especially from the point of view of communicating with new plays – continues to be a problem, but in the first half, the Sixers were solid in this case, holding Portland 41% of the shots. In the second half, Blazers coach Terry Stotts revealed more mismatches and the Sixers had no answers, leaving Portland to collect 63% of the points in the third quarter.
• What hurt the most in the first half was the Blazers who hit the offensive shot. Portland had 14 rebounds before half-time. Overall, the Blazers have overtaken the Sixers, 53-33. Boban Marjanovic seems to be struggling to control the rebounds. What also hurt, is when Marjanovic found himself in pick-and-roll situations with Damian Lillard and Jusuf Nurkic. On these pieces, Marjanovic fights to defend himself, which hurts him on the board.
• In general, Nurkic gave Marjanovic a difficult time. In fact, Brett Brown went to Amir Johnson's place after his stint at the Delaware Blue Coats on Friday night, early in the third quarter, to try to alleviate some of the defensive issues … it did not help. Brown also tried to go little by little, with Mike Scott at five goals, also with mediocre results. It was strange that Brown did not return to Jonah Bolden, who was strong in defense in the first period.
Nurkic scored 24 points and 10 rebounds and new substitute Enes Kanter scored 16 points and eight rebounds.
• Normally, things are going well for Ben Simmons when he is aggressive and looks for his ball early. He did it in this one and took over where he had stopped against the Heat, where he punished them at the post.
He attacked the small Portland guards early and often and it seemed to help him get into the game.
He also took another mid-range rider from the left wing who came and went. It seemed like he was thinking about stopping at three o'clock, but he dribbled some of them and got up. In this situation, it is probably best to take all three and seek the extra point for a low percentage shot.
Despite the loss, Simmons was good in this event, finishing with 29 points (11 of 17), 10 assists and seven rebounds. It's unfortunate that one of his best performances in the NBA was wasted in an eruption.
• During the All Star break, Simmons called Tobias Harris a silent assassin while he was part of ESPN's The Jump. It's such a perfect way to say it. Harris is not brilliant, he's really good.
Even if having an experienced backup team like Boban Marjanovic can help ease Embiid's absence – it's obviously not Saturday – it's even more crucial that the Sixers have another top scorer like Harris. He has strengthened with the center of the stars in the last two games. That was not enough, but he was also fat, recording 20 points (8 of 14, 3 of 7 of 3) and eight rebounds.
• Jimmy Butler's offensive aggression is certainly a good sign for the Sixers. He scored the first two baskets of the match for the Sixers and sought to get to the basket frequently.
The amount of body control that he has in the air is insane. On one piece, T.J. McConnell attempted an alley, but the pass was a bit too high for Butler to finish. Butler was able to pick it up, drop it, dribble under the basket and get an easy basket on the other side of the board.
Butler had 15 points (5 of 9). The three stars of the Sixers were all good in this one. Everyone … not so much.
• JJ Redick went to the break from the stars playing some of his best basketball players, recording 48% of his three attempts in 11 games before the break. In his first two after the break, he really struggled. He was only 4 years old for 12 (3 out of 10 against 3) Thursday against Miami. These struggles continued on Saturday while Redick had scored only seven points on 1 of 10 (1 out of 5 against 3).
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