PHILADELPHIA — The Philadelphia 76ers were short-handed on Thursday night when they played host to the Toronto Raptors. After making the trade to send James Harden to the Los Angeles Clippers, the Sixers acquired four players, but they weren’t ready for game action.
While Marcus Morris Sr., Robert Covington and KJ Martin were all active, the Sixers did not want to throw them on the court considering they don’t know exactly where to be yet on either end of the floor.
Therefore, coach Nick Nurse called upon Furkan Korkmaz to step in and produce. Korkmaz responded by scoring 10 points, and he made a few nice defensive plays in a 114-99 win over the Raptors at home.
“I didn’t get a chance to see much of Furk and (Danuel) House because of health reasons in the preseason,” Nurse said. “I guess I had to make a decision and we just thought we needed just a little — like Furk can handle it a little bit so we just thought we kinda needed the combo of the shooting and the handling with the unit that he went in.”
Korkmaz has been out of the rotation for the Sixers. He didn’t play much in the 2022-23 season under former coach Doc Rivers, and he wasn’t able to play this preseason because of injury. That can hurt the confidence of anybody, but Nurse wanted to make sure Korkmaz’s confidence was high.
“I think it probably started from our first conversation of ‘Furk, how ya doing? You played some really good games against us. I think you’re a good player and I cant wait to see what you got,’” Nurse smiled. “I know he wasn’t in the mix all that much a year ago, but a couple years ago he was and we were game planning for him and all kinds of things so it’s not like it hasn’t been there and it’s not like he hasn’t produced on an NBA stage before.”
Korkmaz is looking to earn minutes. He needs consistency, and this is his opportunity to show it.
“It’s good to be on the court,” Korkmaz said after the win. “I was waiting for this time. I knew that I was gonna get the chance, but I just didn’t know, man, it was today, I think I did a good job.”
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