The Philadelphia 76ers were able to dig deep and rally back to beat the Indiana Pacers on Sunday despite not having Joel Embiid due to the fact that Tobias Harris and the reserves caught fire in the fourth. However, there was one key wrinkle on defense to help them.
Coach Doc Rivers implemented a zone defense in the fourth quarter to try and slow the Pacers down and it worked beautifully. Philadelphia was able to hold Indiana down and they were able to rally and win the game and Rivers made a reference to the late great John Chaney for the defense.
“Just taking them out of rhythm,” said Rivers with a smile. “We called it our John Cheney matchup zone and it was great. Our guys bought into it.”
A big reason why it was so successful was due to the constant activity of Matisse Thybulle. His length and activity bothered the Pacers in the fourth quarter as they were not able to get any clean passes off and it was a big factor in the comeback.
“Matisse did an excellent job on the defensive end and getting stops,” said veteran Dwight Howard. “His defense is, I’m running out a lot of words to describe how amazing his defense is.”
Thybulle had four steals on the night and his experience in the zone, while he was in college at Washington, was definitely useful in this one.
“He was the zone leader for us tonight, that’s for sure,” laughed Harris of Thybulle. “He was out there at the top of the key, knowing his spots, being able to get steals, and it just gave them a different little too. I thought they were in their comfort zone pretty much all game. It was a great move by the coaches to put us in that zone and for us to make it work.”
The second-year guard was excited that the coaches called out a zone for the team to run and he found it fun to play. In the NBA, it is a bit more structured rather than helter-skelter at the college level.
“We joked about in the locker room, but it was like getting back to the good old days of the zone when I was in college and I could just go do whatever I wanted but now with a little more structure,” Thybulle added with a smile. “It was fun. We kind of just threw it together and just played hard through it and got some stuff done.”
The Pacers were just scoring too easily. The Sixers had to make an adjustment and Rivers made the right one on Sunday. That is an adjustment not seen too much in the NBA, but it certainly worked out for Philadelphia.
“At certain points, you got to just throw something out there to get some change and things weren’t going our way and we said let’s just try a zone,” Thybulle added. “We’re talking about my ability in the zone, but there were four other guys who really held it down and we were able to really get a lot of stuff done.”
With a guy like Thybulle on the floor who is so active no matter what is going on, the Sixers feel confident in their ability to run something like a zone.
“He’s continuing to get better,” added Ben Simmons. “His confidence is just is growing.”
This post originally appeared on Sixers Wire! Follow us on Facebook!
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