By: Kylan Watson
The Philadelphia 76ers faced off with a surging Chicago Bulls squad that were looking to end the Sixers six-game win streak. Chicago was able to outexecute Philly throughout the majority of this contest. They hit enough shots to keep the Sixers on their toes and beat them 108-104.
The Sixers hit their shots early in this contest and before the Bulls could even settle into this game, they were down by 12-points. Joel Embiid scored 28 of his 44-points by half-time and there was nothing the Bulls could do to stop him. Embiid got whatever he wanted from the field, and it did not matter if a hand was in his face or not the shot found the bottom of the net. His continued hot scoring has kept the Sixers afloat especially in games when they did not have it all together like tonight, but he did not get enough help besides Tyrese Maxey (29-points). They were the only Sixers who managed to score more than six-points tonight. That was the difference tonight Maxey and Embiid did not get enough help from their teammates in the contest. A big portion of that was the fact Philly just could not throw a brick in the Schuylkill River tonight. Their ball movement created a lot of high percentage shot opportunities, but they just would not fall tonight. One sequence to illustrate the night for Philly in this game was Embiid missed a shot the ball was deflected twice found its way to Kelly Oubre wide-open for a wing three-point shot and it did not fall.
The Bulls took full advantage of the Sixers power outage and were able to retake the lead thanks to the trio of Coby White (24-points), Nikola Vucevic (23-points), and DeMar DeRozan (15-points) combined for 63 of Chicago’s 108-points. White continued his hot December and when the Bulls needed it most, he turned up the heat on the offensive side. He found the bottom of the net and it did not matter what the Sixers did, he found a way to make the shot. His play got the Bulls back in this contest and helped them retake the lead and keep it throughout the rest of the contest. He took full advantage of the Sixers weak perimeter defense throughout the contest and forced them to pay more attention to him which opened up more high-percentage shot opportunities for his teammates which they cashed in on. When the game got tighter DeRozan closed the Sixers out by hitting some tough baskets late in the contest to help his team get the win in this contest.
The Sixers will now prepare to face the Minnesota Timberwolves on Wednesday night and they will need to be stronger on defensive end, because they will see another young rim runner in Anthony Edwards who will always make an opposing defense pay for giving him any opportunity to attack the paint. If they can force him into contested shots and limit the Wolves to one shot opportunity on the offensive side, they will be able to slowdown Minnesota’s explosive offense. Additionally, the Sixers will need to continue to use ball movement to create high percentage shot opportunities like they did tonight, but the shots were not falling. If they can cash in on those opportunities on Wednesday, they should be able to get their 19th victory of the season.
