FORT COLLINS, Colo. — As the Philadelphia 76ers continue training camp, they must get acclimated to new coach Nick Nurse just as he gets acclimated to his new players.
Nurse is in his first season as Philadelphia’s head coach after the Sixers let Doc Rivers go after three seasons on the job. Nurse looks to guide the Sixers over the top in the Eastern Conference after the team fell in the East semifinals three seasons in a row and in five of the past six seasons overall.
One player who is going to be important to whatever the Sixers do is Tyrese Maxey. The young man from Kentucky is entering his fourth season, and he has impressed. He averaged 20.3 points on 43.4% shooting from deep in the 2022-23 season.
Maxey has turned some heads at training camp, including coach Nurse’s.
“Maxey was unbelievable (Wednesday),” Nurse said. “He had one of those days where nobody could catch him on anything. He was really providing a lot of juice for his team today getting get into the basket a lot and causing a lot of problems for some of the guys.”
Nurse has coached against Maxey. The Sixers and the Toronto Raptors matched up in the playoffs in 2022. Though he saw Maxey up close in that series, being his coach is something else altogether.
“I’m always super impressed with his range and how well and the ease he’s shooting the ball from deep,” Nurse added. “That’s kind of one thing that it just comes off so effortlessly, and he really shoots at well. There’s this kind of, I can’t quite put my finger on or haven’t seen it before, but there’s this some quirk there that of shiftiness that he loses people on the perimeter and then he’s wide open for 3.”
The Sixers have some solid perimeter defenders on their team, including De’Anthony Melton, Patrick Beverley and young Jaden Springer. It appears Maxey is making quick work of just about everybody who crosses his path.
“Being totally guarded and all of a sudden, I don’t know, even what I’m watching, I think he’s going that way and he ends up over here and he’s created the space to get the 3 off,” Nurse continued. “So I’m keeping an eye on that a little bit because I just kind of started noticing that today how nobody can kind of stay with him and he creates his space. It’s good. It’s interesting.”
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