It was not easy for Philadelphia 76ers forward Tobias Harris on Tuesday night. He shot a ridiculous 4-for-17 and an awful 0-for-11 from deep and he heard the boos from the Philadelphia faithful. Yet, he made some big plays down the stretch to help the Sixers rally for a 98-97 win over the Cleveland Cavaliers on Tuesday.
What those fans did not know is that Harris was playing through a stomach virus and coach Brett Brown did not know that he was going to play until just about three hours before tip-off. It was an off night for Harris, but his play down the stretch was clutch for Philadelphia.
Joel Embiid, who led the way with 27 points and 16 rebounds had praise for Harris.
It says a lot. He’s going to battle through stuff. Like I said, shots are going to fall and they’re not sometimes. When it matters, he showed up.
.@JoelEmbiid has high praise for @tobias31 #Sixers pic.twitter.com/qQxNFqiBsR
— Ky Carlin (@Ky_Carlin) November 13, 2019
Richardson, who also had a tough night shooting it as he shot 1-for-8 from distance, also had some big words for Harris’ toughness:
Tobias is a tough guy. He’s hard to shake. He’s hard to fluster and he was vocal the whole game and he kept shooting. I commend him for that. I was telling him to stay aggressive and to shoot his shots so I’m proud of him for fighting through that.
At the end of the day, the Sixers will need Harris to shoot the ball much better going forward. They aren’t paying him $180 million to go 0-for-11 from deep, sick or not. He came into the night shooting 28.6% from deep and that will surely go down after this performance.
Philadelphia will now head south to Orlando to face the Magic to start a three-game road trip. [lawrence-related id=19170,19121,19093]