A few familiar themes popped up for the Philadelphia 76ers on Monday night. They played a great first half where Ben Simmons led an aggressive defensive effort on their way to nine-point halftime lead.
Then, much like in Saturday’s loss to the Dallas Mavericks, they fell apart. They gave up 61 points in the second half compared to just 40 in the first and it resulted in a 101-95 loss to the Indiana Pacers. Indiana got to the free-throw line 31 times and they sealed the game from the line.
“I think we had great energy to start, then we started fouling too much,” said Simmons. “I mean, you talk about knowing their personnel and who we’re guarding. Too many guys getting open, hot guys who were knocking down shots, so that played into it as well.”
The Pacers play a physical brand of basketball led by Domantas Sabonis down low and it’s reinforced by Malcolm Brogdon and Myles Turner. Philadelphia knew that they would have to defend without fouling and they did a poor job of doing so late in the game.
On top of that, the turnover issue revealed its ugly head once again. The Sixers had a chance to win this game late, but the lack of defensive execution combined with the turnovers cost them down the stretch.
“I liked that defense for the very large majority of the game,” said coach Brett Brown. “I think their offensive rebounds in the second half bothered us. We drove into a crowd a lot in the fourth period. I think three of our turnovers just came in trying to penetrate and sort of getting stuck.”
The Pacers used that physicality to force the Sixers into things that they didn’t want to do. That caused a lot of issues and it caused them to really force some things which can lead to a lot of rushed plays.
“Just trying to make plays but their length, their athleticism bothered us,” he added. “In general, those are the thoughts that are most on my mind.”
Nonetheless, the Sixers are now 7-14 on the road and have lost six in a row away from the Wells Fargo Center. They will return home on Wednesday to host the Brooklyn Nets. [lawrence-related id=23388,23361,23351]