The Philadelphia 76ers earned themselves an impressive 121-109 win over the Milwaukee Bucks on Christmas Day on Wednesday and they are feeling good about themselves.
Before the game began, general manager Elton Brand gave his end of the year press conference where he gave his thoughts on everything surrounding the team.
One aspect about his team has been the play of Josh Richardson who has done a terrific job of being the team’s glue guy and being the guy who keeps the team together a bit. He has struggled a bit since returning from a hamstring injury that kept him out for six games, but he was really cooking before the injury averaging 22 points and shooting 60% from the floor over the three games before suffering the injury on November 27.
“Pre-injury, it was special,” said Brand. “It was that piece where we were saying ‘Wow, this is something we haven’t had in a while. This is something that’s going to help carry us’. Missing eight games (in total this season), getting your legs back, I see him being a go-to scorer for this team in the future.”
Richardson was brought in to give the Sixers help in all aspects of the game on both ends of the floor. He is a good perimeter defender and he’s adept at running the pick-and-roll and as a secondary ball-handler next to Ben Simmons. He also has big scoring capabilities when he gets right.
Richardson had 18 points in the win over the Bucks and he drilled four 3-pointers in the win. He is not only working back from the hamstring injury, but also a wrist injury he suffered against in a win over the Boston Celtics on December 12. Postgame, he said he’s beginning to feel a bit better.
“Yeah, I finally got to take the tape off my wrist,” said a smiling Richardson. “Well actually I just took it off by myself, I didn’t even tell anyone. It’s feeling better so I feel better about that.”
The Sixers have plenty of go-to scoring options, such as Joel Embiid and Tobias Harris for example, but Richardson can play a role in that aspect of the game. There’s a lot to his game that can help the Sixers grow into the championship contenders that they expect to be. [lawrence-related id=22156,22146,22137]