The Philadelphia 76ers were able to walk away with a 106-103 win over the Los Angeles Clippers on Friday in order to keep their lead over the Brooklyn Nets for the race for the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference. However, it did not come easy as the Clippers certainly made them work for it.
Los Angeles caught fire from deep and they were able to knock down some shots in order to get themselves back into the game before Philadelphia put them away late. It was a game that the Sixers can be proud of as they were down two starters as well as a key bench player in the win.
The Sixers also did hurt themselves a bit with some mental errors. The schedule has been so compact since the All-Star break and there have been so many games that the team has not had much of a break. It seemed to affect them when it came to their defensive effort and little mistakes on offense.
“I was not happy at halftime, because I think we were up 12 and I really thought we should have been up 20,” said coach Doc Rivers. “Whenever that happens, you know the second half is going to be a game where I thought we had a chance to take them out in the first half and we didn’t take advantage of that.”
Rivers was not wrong about that. Philadelphia started the game up 20-3 as they jumped on Los Angeles early and they threatened to pull away, but the Clippers cut it to 12 going into the half. They then took a lead in the second half as the Sixers were left scrambling.
“I thought we played really hard. I thought they played really hard and I thought there were a lot of mistakes from both teams,” Rivers finished. “A little bit of that was fatigue. You can see that. The harder and more tired you get, the brain is the first thing to cut off, and you can see that a little bit tonight.”
From a player standpoint, this schedule has been brutal. Games almost every other day and then on the off days, they are not truly real off days. The players have to get up early and go get tested every day and that can affect their play on the floor both physically and mentally.
“It could have been fatigue, but there’s things we got to clean up and build habits on,” said Simmons. “We gotta get some good habits in there in terms of our defense.”
The Sixers will now have two needed days off before facing the Golden State Warriors on Monday at home.
This post originally appeared on Sixers Wire! Follow us on Facebook!
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