By: Kylan Watson

The Philadelphia 76ers started their rough five-game road trip with the new-look Indiana Pacers. The Sixers could not buy many buckets from the three-point line and the Pacers made 12/27 shots from there. Which helped them beat Philly 134-122 and snap the Sixers six-game win streak.

Philly did not have it in tonight’s contest, they were missing many high-percentage shots that were created from their ball movement. Most of those misses were from the three-point line, they only made seven/29 from beyond the arc and the Pacers just could not miss. Indiana ran Philly off the floor they forced some early turnovers which allowed them to make easy shots and the Sixers got nothing easy from the field. Despite all of that this game was still winnable for Philly, they were able to cut Indiana’s lead down to 12-point by half-time. However, the third quarter was the defining quarter for the Pacers. They made their shots and went on a 10-to-nothing scoring run and that ended this game. The Pacers had seven players in double-figures tonight and the trio of Pascal Siakam (26-points, grabbed 13-rebounds, and had 10-assists), Myles Turner (20-points), and Buddy Hield (19-points) combined for 65 of the Pacers’ 134-points and the Sixers had no answers for either of them. They were missing a lot of key defensive pieces and that showed up tonight as each member of the trio was able to impose their will on this game. Siakam in particular took full advantage of Tobias Harris missing this game with an illness, and the Sixers having no one other than Joel Embiid who could stay with him on defense.

Despite the scoring explosion from Siakam, Turner, and Hield the Sixers still had this game within reach. When Philly looks back at the tape on this game, they will see that they got outhustled and outmuscled by a healthier Pacers squad who wanted it more. Joel Embiid (31-points) and Tyrese Maxey (22-points) did all they could to keep the Sixers afloat, but not having enough healthy players finally caught up with them in tonight’s game. Philly was missing six players in this game and when you play a team that wants to play fast you need a lot of bodies to handle it and the Sixers did not have the horses for it tonight.

Now the Sixers will prepare to face the Denver Nuggets for the second time in two-weeks. If they want to sweep this season series with the Nuggets, they will need to make sure Denver’s shooters take difficult shots and limit them to one possession on the offensive end. Additionally, they will need to continue to use ball movement especially while being short-handed. The Sixers will need to take and make the high-percentage shots that are created from their ball movement something they did not do tonight. If they can implement these things into their game-plan they can get their 30^th victory of the season.