The banged up Philadelphia 76ers are in a bad stretch. After taking a 132-94 thrashing from the Milwaukee Bucks on Saturday while missing their two best players, they have lost four games in a row — all without Ben Simmons.
Now, they are the No. 2 seed in the East standings.
The Sixers have a relatively easy schedule stretch coming up: A game against the Oklahoma City Thunder is followed by two games with the Atlanta Hawks, who might not have Trae Young.
Philadelphia just now needs to get guys back and come together for the final run.
“Everybody’s got to get healthy, that’s No. 1,” said Tobias Harris after Thursday’s loss. “We’d be able to really arrive at the playoffs with a healthy unit. Mentally and physically, and just be focusing the main goal of what’s at hand.”
Out of the mix of veterans and younger players, the veterans have to step up and provide until Simmons and Joel Embiid can return.
“We focus, recalibrate, get ourselves ready for the next, and just be ready,” Harris added. “It’s one-by-one, one game at a time, stay locked in, we handle our business. So that’s, that’s my message.”
One silver lining: The team can see how George Hill can work within various lineups even if they aren’t necessarily the lineups he will play with in the postseason. And the losses provide lessons he can teach the youngsters.
“I was always taught you never get too high, you never get too low,” said Hill. “You’re gonna have good wins. You’re gonna have bad wins. You’re gonna have bad losses and good losses, so I don’t count losses as bad losses. They’re always kind of a learning lesson, so it’s a lot that we can learn from in this game.”
There are a lot of lessons the Bucks taught them, but with Hill in the fold along with Danny Green and Dwight Howard, they have a great deal of wisdom they can pass down to the youngsters and get their heads right for the final stretch.
“With myself, Dwight in some cases, and things like that who have high playoff experience, and been on some really good teams, I think guys weigh on us in trying to find ways to talk about what we experienced in the playoffs, and the success we’ve had, and the failures that we’ve had to not try to go down that path,” Hill stated. “I’m looking forward to it. I think we have a great opportunity once we get healthy, but at the same time, we do have to look ourselves in the mirror and start playing better.”
Philadelphia will move on to host the Oklahoma City Thunder on Monday.
This post originally appeared on Sixers Wire! Follow us on Facebook!
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