Game 10: Sixers Annihilated by Spurs

by Jordan Sams on Nov 13, 2010 8:30 PM PST in Philadelphia 76ers Recaps

The Spurs jumped out to a double digit lead six minutes into the game and never looked back. They abused the Sixers every which way. Don't let the 23 point margin fool you; this game wasn't even that close. Holiday and company were continuosly blown by on the perimeter, Hawes and Brand did their best swiss cheese impression in the paint, and the Sixers offense was completely stagnant. Disappointing, yet expected. The Sixers were playing their third game in four nights, all against near-elite teams. The Spurs were playing at home after two days rest. The Spurs are also good, and the Sixers aren't, who fall to 2-8 on the season.

Normally I'd take this time to break down some of the good things the Sixers accomplished – particularly the young guys we anticipate development from – but zero good can be taken from tonight's game. Approximately eight hours from now, Tanner may get home from the wedding he was attending, with nearly 200 ounces of beer in his belly and fresh Limp Bizkit tattoo on his left butt cheek, look at the box score and loudly mumble, "Jrue Holiday done made 16 points and 5 assists!" Well this nugget of information is for Tanner or any other casual box score reader: Jrue Holiday had 2 points, 2 assists and 5 turnovers going into the fourth quarter. The Sixers were down 32 at the time. Jrue then proceeded to drop 14 garbage time points and 3 assists against 2010 Sixers Training Camp Invitee extraordinaire Chris Quinn – who was on accompanied on defense by Alonzo Gee, Gary Neal, Matt Bonner and Tiago Splitter. Translation: Jrue sucked.

Not to pick on Jrue, but I'm becoming more and more concerned with the amount of times he's getting absolutely toasted on defense. His D is supposed to be his meal ticket, yet it's been incredibly underwhelming through 10 games. In the past two nights alone JJ Barea and Tony Parker have blown by him at least 5 times.

I could go on forever on how the Sixers blew chunks all over themselves tonight, but I won't. It's one game. They're a young team. They're a flawed team. And the schedule dealt them their first rough patch of the 2010-2011 season. They have two days off before traveling to Cleveland for the final game of a 5-game road trip. Cleveland's been decent thus far, but they're more in the Sixers' ballpark in terms of talent than the Knicks, Thunder, Mavs or Spurs. Let's see if Collins can regroup, rid the team from the stench of tonight's vomit, and get them back to playing respectable basketball.

#missionBJ'ers rejoice!

Player of the Game: Andres Nocioni

Up Next: @ Cleveland on Tuesday

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Comments

i havent seen the sixers ply much this year, but i like jrue very much so i have to ask:

are you sure its jrue’s fault and not the bigs? because when you say that hawes and brand played together i think things like, “hopefully a comet hits the stadium, because thats the only way those guys together will not be scored on.”

'David Lee is better than Taj Gibson, that is a fact. Consequently, Dorell Wright can shut down Deng.'

Can’t argue with that logic…

- Sleepy Freud

by TheMoon on Nov 13, 2010 10:30 PM PST reply actions

It’s clearly not ALL Jrue’s fault but he played very poorly. The problem is that we don’t expect much from Brand and Hawes but we expect better from Jrue.

by yosoysean on Nov 14, 2010 12:12 AM PST up reply actions

not all jrues fault at all.. i mean he didn’t play well against the spurs but I mean let’s get real here there the spurs on our last game of a really long super tough west coast road trip and the spurs were well rested- You do the math. Championship caliber teams do this to crappy teams when they come in to their house, they beat the hell out of them. No but seriously Jrue has been playing good this year he just played really poorly this game but you just have to consider the circumstances. Also Brand has played well and the big Spenc has sucked really bad pretty much the entire time this year.

by jrb5094 on Nov 15, 2010 8:49 AM PST up reply actions

Zero points for the villain in almost 30 minutes of court time what was he doing?

and Speights got a lot of playing time it seems how did he look?

by Tron79 on Nov 14, 2010 6:27 AM PST reply actions

I didn’t watch the game but I can offer this: Speights has virtually flopped in every game sans one: The Indiana Game. The one and only game he’s actually looked decent.

Now as far as Jrue’s concerned, he’s not using his 6’4 body and frame, it’s that simple. He’s quick enough to keep up with them and he thinks that alone is enough to contest the shot. You’ve got to use your body and frame and make it difficult for them to drive past you. Give them some contact(He did this extremely well last year).

I don’t know why Jrue’s not playing fundamentally sound defense, and yes it’s not all his fault. If you had shotblocking bigs(Like a certain Sammy), teams wouldn’t want to drive all that often. Allowing Jrue to feel comfortable in playing more aggressive defense.

He’s being conservative and not aggressive and it’s burning him.

Now as far as ET. He was looking much better in the OKC, Knicks games right? What was the common denominator in those games? Andre Iguodala. A wing that can’t shoot or play off the ball. A wing that turns it over. In other words, he’s very very average at best.

by LeQuan Glover on Nov 14, 2010 7:12 AM PST up reply actions

If the villain moved more slower he'd be dead

Where’s the aggressive, do-everything point forward I saw at OSU last year? I understand being patient with young players but you want your No. 2 pick to kill those SA bums in garbage time, he’s way to reserved, STEP YA GAME UP, ET!!

by ThePaceMaker on Nov 14, 2010 6:58 AM PST reply actions