3 observations after Harden slams door shut, Sixers get first win

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The Sixers' stars ensured Monday night that the team doesn't have to face any further questions about being winless.

James Harden posted 29 points, 11 assists and nine rebounds in a 120-106 victory at Wells Fargo Center over the Pacers as the Sixers improved to 1-3. Joel Embiid had 26 points, five rebounds and three blocks. 

“From the fans’ perspective, they probably wanted me to be traded and the whole team to be sent down to the G League," Embiid said. “But to me, it’s no pressure. It’s 0-3, three games. ... New team trying to find their way. And I thought today we took a big step offensively and defensively."

Tyrese Haliburton led the Pacers with 19 points and 10 assists. 

Indiana’s Daniel Theis (right knee soreness) and Myles Turner (left ankle sprain) were sidelined. 

The Sixers will begin a four-game road trip with a two-game mini-series on Wednesday and Friday against the Raptors.

Here are observations on the team's first win: 

Sixers glad to fire from beyond the arc 

Outside of perhaps being a tad heavy on possessions that lasted late into the shot clock as Harden dribbled the ball, the Sixers’ offense was fine in the early going.

Tobias Harris scored the game’s first points on a second-chance three. The Sixers kept firing from long range, to put it mildly, attempting 26 first-half threes. Their 43 attempts in the game tied last season's high mark. 

While Sixers president of basketball operations Daryl Morey’s analytically-inclined approach is one important reason his Harden-led Rockets teams launched so many threes compared to the rest of the league, it’s not the only one. Harden is great at getting them off. He pulls the defense in his direction, too, which inevitably creates three-point opportunities for teammates even against opponents that don’t send full-on blitzes at the 10-time All-Star. With Harden on their team, the Sixers should not struggle in terms of taking enough threes. 

The team hammered home pace and ball movement Monday morning.

"We went over it at shootaround today," Harris said. "The emphasis was to get that ball moving, get the ball touching everybody’s hands. … We were able to find open and easy shots, and that was what really opened up the game for us tonight.”

Defensively, the Sixers didn’t start especially well. After a Harden three, Jalen Smith beat the Sixers down the floor and scored an and-one layup on P.J. Tucker, putting the Pacers ahead 14-13.

As it needed to, the team’s collective defensive effort ultimately improved. The Sixers were also fortunate that Bennedict Mathurin cooled off drastically at the beginning of the game, starting 0 for 7. The No. 6 overall pick had averaged 24 points and made 11 of his first 21 NBA threes before Monday night. 

At the end of the evening, the Sixers had 21 more points from beyond the arc than Indiana, sinking 19 threes to the Pacers' 12.

Bench’s strong start 

The Sixers’ bench took almost no time to reverse the early-season trend of opposing second units producing significantly more points. Against Indiana, they scored the game’s first 15 bench points.

Danuel House Jr. made a corner three-pointer on his first touch to give the Sixers an 18-17 lead. On the team’s next possession, he crashed hard for an offensive rebound and was rewarded with a put-back layup. 

House has already shown that his knack for finding off-script ways to make an impact is one of his better qualities. Of course, the Sixers also want him to be solid at playing within their structure and consistently executing the team’s schemes as they’re designed. He still needs to prove he can be reliable at that part of the job. Still, House has shown at times why head coach Doc Rivers liked his two-way game enough to make him a stable rotation member right away. The 29-year-old made a nice play early in the second quarter when he pump faked a three, forced the defense to pinch in with his drive, and then threw a cross-court assist to Georges Niang. 

The first triple of the night for Niang came in the first period when he set a drag screen for Harden, popped behind the arc, and let it fly. Those two learned through experience last year that the pick-and-pop is worth trying a fair amount when they share the floor. 

The Sixers subbed Embiid out in the middle of the first, as Rivers plans to while the MVP runner-up works his way into better shape. Montrezl Harrell’s rim-running and chemistry with Harden were both helpful in his first stint. When Harrell sprinted down the floor and got a mismatch on T.J. McConnell, Harden recognized immediately and allowed Harrell to earn two free throws. Harrell went 5 for 6 from the foul line in the opening frame. 

Rivers expanded his rotation in the first half, using 11 players. One of them was Shake Milton, whose second-quarter action was his first of the season. Later in the second, Rivers played De’Anthony Melton (11 points, five rebounds) instead of Tyrese Maxey alongside the Sixers’ starters. Unsurprisingly, Melton has looked most comfortable next to a high-level ball handler or two. In those lineups, he’s able to play his natural game and take what comes to him, not worry about generating offense from scratch. 

Paul Reed also appeared for three minutes in the second quarter, and his steal leading to a Harris transition layup was a crowd-pleaser. Reed came back early in the fourth when Embiid picked up his fifth foul, though Rivers re-inserted his star center with a little over six minutes left. 

While the Sixers should care plenty about regular-season wins, it makes sense to keep players like Reed, Milton and Matisse Thybulle in the mix when it’s feasible. The Sixers’ “11th man” is better than the average team’s, so there’s generally not as much risk in being sure certain bench players don't stay on the sidelines for many games in a row.

This early into a season, it would also be extremely premature to proclaim the current (fluid) pecking order as the best one for the playoffs. 

Harden slams door shut 

Following Saturday’s loss to the Spurs, Rivers had said the Sixers were “not ready to win yet.”

Though they now have a victory, there were several moments Monday that supported Rivers’ point. Basketball can indeed be a “game of runs,” but the Sixers fed into some of Indiana’s momentum. When the Pacers responded to a 48-29 deficit with a 5-0 spurt, Rivers called timeout. He’s seemed aware that his team hasn’t been very good at working through issues on its own. 

“It depends on the time in the game,” Rivers said pregame. “There’s times you have to. Usually, you’re not reacting to just that play; it’s usually several plays that have led you to that point. But there were several self-inflicted defensive wounds in the game (against the Spurs) that we just didn’t handle very well.”

The Sixers started the second half badly, conceding the first four points and then surviving two three-point tries by Buddy Hield and one by Mathurin on a single possession. They had another rough sequence near the end of the third quarter when Maxey missed a runner, falling to 1 for 9 from the floor, and Mathurin then scored inside off an offensive rebound. Early in the fourth, McConnell’s trademark backcourt thievery set Mathurin up for an and-one layup. An open Chris Duarte three trimmed the Sixers’ lead to 95-85.

Harden then closed the deal in a manner reminiscent to his Game 4 playoff performance against the Heat last year. 

After Embiid was called for his fifth foul, Harden drained three triples and a mid-range jumper over the next 5:01. Those shots won’t drop every fourth quarter — Harden went 4 for 18 from the field as recently as Saturday — but his tough shotmaking was sure nice to have Monday.

It erased any doubts about the 2022-23 Sixers indeed being capable of winning. 

“He’s been doing great," Embiid said of Harden. “I’m happy for him, and we’re going to need him. We’re going to need for him to be confident and really feel himself.

“Now we’ve just got to get everybody playing at the same level so we can win games, but he’s been great to see. He’s been playing at a high level and I know he’s been working so hard to be at this point, so I’m happy for him.”

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