The Philadelphia 76ers were hit with some bad news pregame as they found out that Joel Embiid will undergo surgery and be out at least 1-2 weeks. That fact means that other guys have to step up and they certainly did so in a 109-98 win over the Boston Celtics on Thursday.
They received a big night out of Al Horford, which is expected given who he is and how proven he is in his career, but Norvel Pelle came in and provided some more good production in solid minutes for them. Pelle had six points, four rebounds, and two blocks in 12:38 as he gave the team some good energy defensively protecting the rim and he was good offensively as a roller and catching lobs.
“Now defensively, I thought we really did a good job from the beginning,” said Tobias Harris. “Norvel came in and gave us huge a lift of energy with his ability to block shots. His spirit out there was big for us.”
An effort like Thursday’s gives coach Brett Brown a sense of who can be the backup big man to Horford. His presence defensively is a big part of this team.
“Look at what he can do,” said Brown. “Zoom in to what is his skillset and let’s start with he is a rim protector and then go to offense and say he is a roller. Those two things are quite valuable and he is quite different to our team. Then you get into who’s going to run the pick-and-roll with him and you have Ben (Simmons) and J-Rich (Josh Richardson) who are exceptional at doing that and so you’ve got Norvel rolling behind that and you can see why we would look at him as that’s a young prospect that interests us a lot.”
Philadelphia will have some things they need to work out to hold down the fort until Embiid returns so why not give Pelle a legitimate look? He’s proven that he can play well enough to give them a different look on both ends of the floor. Fans can expect to see a lot more of Mr. Pelle in the upcoming weeks. [lawrence-related id=23169,23161,23154]