Is it possible to neutralize a player on his way to a 39-point, 24-rebound performance?
According to the Sixers’ Henry Sims, it’s not only possible — he and his second-unit teammates did it.
Getting his first action in four games, Sims played a 12-minute stretch during the second half in which the Sixers rallied from 18 points down with 8:46 to go in the third quarter to a six-point lead by the end of the frame. Thanks to Sims in the third quarter, the Sixers pulled out an improbable 114-107 victory over the Sacramento Kings on Friday night at the Wells Fargo Center despite the best efforts of DeMarcus Cousins (see Instant Replay).
Cousins scored a season-high 39 points with a career-high 24 rebounds in the game with 22 points and 15 boards coming during the first half. So how much he was neutralized is open to interpretation. But as Sims explained it, Cousins didn’t get very many gimmes in the second half.
Sure, Cousins piled on the stats, but he had to earn them.
“We had to neutralize DeMarcus. What did he have, 100 and 100 or something like that?” Sims said. “He’s a magnificent player and a real beast down there, so we had to cut out his touches and cut out his looks for a few possessions and make it difficult for him.”
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Again, neutralizing a guy who went for 39 and 24 is a matter of semantics.
“I just tried to make everything difficult for him,” Sims said. “Everything. Rebounds, looks and do whatever it took to make it tough is what I had to do.”
Take Cousins’ tough work out of the equation and the rest of the Kings were held in check. Cousins went 12 for 24 from the field and 15 for 20 from the foul line, but his teammates combined to go 23 for 63 (36.5 percent). Only Rudy Gay (24 points) and Derrick Williams (15 points) joined Cousins in double-digit scoring.
Incredibly, the Kings scored 42 points in the second quarter but only 43 points in the entire second half.
“Everybody sees what I see,” Sixers head coach Brett Brown said about Sims. “You see a teammate up and down. He’s enthusiastic. When you put him in the game and have him perform the way he did just speaks volumes about him. It’s a great example to our young guys to have a look at what Henry still does and to see that he is ready when he’s called upon.”
Brown admits that Sims might not have played for a fourth straight game — after missing four of the last five — had Cousins not been so formidable during the first half. The Sixers had no answers.
And then Brown found Sims.
“We did a great job transitioning into the second half with our defense,” Nerlens Noel said. “Hats off to Henry Sims. He made a lot of big plays for us down the stretch.”
When Sims wasn’t dueling with Cousins, he dropped in four buckets and grabbed four rebounds. Nope, nothing to jump off that stat sheet, but sometimes the stats don’t tell the story.
Meanwhile, the Sixers put seven players in double-figure scoring with Robert Covington leading the way with 24 points while Noel had 16 points and 12 rebounds for his fifth double-double in the last eight games.
Noel and Cousins, both big men who played briefly in college for Kentucky, jousted throughout the game with the Sixer taking more lumps than he dished out. However, when Brown turned to Sims and his second unit for a long stretch in the third quarter, Noel got some relief.
Notably, support came from Thomas Robinson, who helped Sims bang with Cousins and wiped the glass clean for 11 boards in 20 minutes, while Jerami Grant (13 points), Hollis Thompson (10 points) and Ish Smith (10 points and nine assists) contributed key minutes.
Typically, Brown likes to get his starting unit back in the game with seven or eight minutes left in the fourth quarter, but against the Kings he let Sims and the rest of the reserves stretch their legs a little longer.
By the time Brown put the starters back in, the Sixers led by nine after building a lead to 13 points.
“That second group came in to the point where it got confusing,” Brown said. “I was prepared to let it go quite far. I let it ride until about the four-minute mark and I was worried it went to late because that second group played so well.”
Brown and the Sixers will need the second group on Saturday night, too, when they host the Brooklyn Nets in a back-to-back. The Sixers have a busy week starting Monday with a game in Boston followed by a game at home on Wednesday against Detroit and Friday night against the Knicks.