MIAMI — When the Philadelphia 76ers turn to Paul Reed off the bench, they don’t know how the results are going to go. However, the Sixers have been turning to the third-year big man out of DePaul more often off the bench
In Wednesday’s win over the Miami Heat, Reed showed how he can help. He had 16 points, a career-high 14 rebounds, and he was a plus-26 off the bench. He made a big difference against the Heat while doing a solid job of defending Miami star Bam Adebayo.
“Honestly, coming into this game, I was taking it personal,” said Reed. “We lost to this team in the playoffs last year, and we lost to them the other night and so I really had a chip on my shoulder. I really wanted to prove a point.”
Reed has the potential to be a very good rotation player in this league, and PJ Tucker has been pushing him as of late.
“I’ve been on Paul Reed’s case a lot lately,” Tucker laughed. “So to see him come out tonight (Wednesday), play well, have great energy, he was all over the place. So it was good to see have a big game.”
What exactly has Tucker been getting on Reed about?
“Everything,” he said with another laugh. “Everything. Young guys, you gotta stay on top of them all the time. I was on him today. He had a great game.”
Reed then got into some specifics about what Tucker has been talking to him about. The most important thing at the moment is defensive communication. He still has to lead that second unit as the anchor on defense.
“PJ gets on me about communication on the defensive end,” Reed stated. “He sees a lot of himself in me. A great on-ball defender, a guy that’s active, a guy that’s got to be vocal.”
In the loss to the Heat at home on Monday, Reed wasn’t great in that department. So Tucker made it a point to tell him and continue his growth.
“After last game, he was telling me ‘Come on. I need you to be more vocal and you can’t make any game plan mistakes’ and just the amount of focus that you need in order to level up for real,” Reed added. “That’s how he was explaining it to me. It was great to hear, and I needed to hear it and it kind of changed my mentality. For sure.”
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