After the Philadelphia 76ers took another loss on their home floor 117-98 to the Dallas Mavericks on Friday, the Sixers have now had three straight games of subpar defensive efforts.
Everybody wants to blame the offense, and it’s a legitimate gripe considering their struggles against the zone, but the other end has let the team down lately. On Friday, they allowed the Mavericks to shoot 51.8% from the floor and allowed Tim Hardaway Jr. to knock down seven 3-pointers. Something’s got to give.
“We’re not following the game plan,” said Joel Embiid. “Like tonight, Tim Hardaway, we had him as a hot guy. We’ve got to do a better job of following the game plan. At the end of the day, I feel like it’s not on the coaches. We’ve got to play with energy. He made seven threes, if going into a game you know that a guy is a shooter, you should not give him any space so we’ve got to do a better job of respecting what we’re supposed to do and just be aggressive.”
Have the struggles against the zone manifested itself in their defense?
“Yes,” said Al Horford quickly. “I think we were much better against the zone, in my opinion, tonight I don’t think offensively was the problem. I just think defensively, you’re giving up 117 points that’s just way too many points. That’s a good team over there, but they don’t even have Luka (Doncic) so it’s definitely a cause for concern for our group.”
Al Horford is more upset with the team’s defense rather than the offense tonight #Sixers pic.twitter.com/ZVav8ok6o6
— Ky Carlin (@Ky_Carlin) December 21, 2019
Embiid, who led Philadelphia with 33 points and 17 rebounds on the night, was also very upset with the team’s defensive effort.
“We could be so much better defensively,” said Embiid. “We didn’t do a good job against Miami, against Brooklyn, and tonight. There’s definitely a lot of work to do.”
The Sixers were having a tough time from the jump on Friday that made it seem like they weren’t on the right page defensively from the beginning.
“Our defense is not at the level it needs to be,” said Al Horford. “For whatever reason, it’s just not there. All around we’re not playing good enough defensively.”
The Sixers will play host to the Washington Wizards, a team that also gives them struggles defensively, on Saturday. A win would quiet a lot of the skeptics, but they seem to be lost a little bit right now. [lawrence-related id=21765,21751,21736]