BOSTON–It was a tale of two halves for Philadelphia 76ers forward Tobias Harris on Friday in a 125-119 loss to the Boston Celtics. Overall, Harris shot 6-for-16 for 14 points and five rebounds with four steals, but his play in the second half was not pretty.
In the first half on Friday, Harris shot 5-for-7 for 11 points and he was a plus-7. After halftime, he shot just 1-for-9 for three points and was a minus-12. He made his first shot of the second half, a 3-pointer, and then went on to miss his final eight shots.
On a night when the Sixers had a chance to steal one without Joel Embiid, Tyrese Maxey, Nic Batum, and other key pieces, Philadelphia needed Harris to do more.
“Just would like him to just stay in a little bit more in attack mode,” coach Nick Nurse said of Harris after the loss. “He just seemed a little bit back on his heels a little bit and, if he’s getting that pressure out on the floor like that, I talk to him about just you’re gonna have to attack that. You can’t play at east-west you’re gonna have to try to get north-south on that just a little bit. We’ll work on that with him.”
In Harris’ defense, there were a few moments when Harris was attacking the basket and being aggressive, but he got his dunk blocked twice. Once by Al Horford and the other one by Jaylen Brown, although it did look like Harris was fouled by Brown, it ultimately does not matter.
“I was attacking,” Harris stated. “I got my shot blocked a few times. A couple of them probably trying to alter up the speed a little bit and see, but that’s something we always talked about from the beginning of the year is getting out and attacking in transition and trying to create some easy ones. Just tonight, I didn’t think on a few of them, they just weren’t there tonight, to be honest in the transition.”
In the fourth, Harris shot 0-for-5 and had two turnovers. The Sixers were right there, but Philadelphia wasn’t able to finish the job and Harris took responsibility for his play late.
“I definitely thought we were in there to get the win,” Harris added. “A couple mistakes. Turnovers, myself included, so that hurt us. Those are possessions we gotta value, gotta be better at, I’m speaking on myself in those moments out there so obviously, a learning experience for us, but at the same time, definitely some positives we can take from it.”
The Sixers will now have four days off before they take on the Washington Wizards on the road on Wednesday.
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