The Philadelphia 76ers were hit in the mouth on Tuesday by the host New York Knicks, and they did not respond very well. The Knicks outscored them 39-16 in the second quarter on their way to a 62-42 halftime lead, and they went on to win 112-99.
Afterward, coach Doc Rivers was upset with his team’s lack of response to New York’s physicality. The Sixers were not able to get into any offensive rhythm and allowed the Knicks to do whatever they wanted to do on the other end.
Philadelphia committed seven turnovers in the second quarter. They were not aggressive enough on that end. The Knicks stood them up, and they did not give them any real battle. The Sixers did not move their bodies on the offensive end. They did not move the ball. They were sped up, and it almost seemed as if they were intimidated by New York.
“Our counter has to be moving ourselves more and being physical as well, we can’t get too stagnant,” said Tobias Harris who had nine assists. “I thought we got too stagnant offensively out there, which allowed them to get into our space.”
Philadelphia can combat that by playing its game. It needs to get stops and get out and run, which then allows them to play with the pace it wants to get easy baskets.
“The flip side is that every time they go down and score and we take the ball out and bring it up offensively, it is a different ball game if we are making them miss shots and we are coming at them in transition and catching them off guard, so it is a two-fold there,” Harris added. “Those are ways we can combat it better than we did tonight for sure. It is a learning experience.”
The Sixers have an opportunity to learn from Tuesday’s loss when they begin a four-game homestand on Thursday against the lowly Detroit Pistons. It is a chance for them to work against a lower-level team and build some momentum at home.
“We have to get better from this game, No. 1,” Harris finished. “We also need to have good focus on how we are going to play no matter who we are going up against whether it is bottom of the pack teams or playoff teams, physical teams, however you want to call it. We have to figure out the style of that and it starts first with our defense, and we have a home stretch here where we can improve on that.”
This post originally appeared on Sixers Wire! Follow us on Facebook!
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