This seems like a theme. We play one of the best teams in the league. I say there's no chance at us winning. One or two of the opponent's best players sit out. We win. That was the case against Boston, Portland, Sacramento, and now Denver.
With Melo and Chauncey out, Denver only played 7 guys more than 10 minutes, and basically tired out in the second half. We jumped out to an early 3rd quarter deficit lead (wait, what?), and despite all but coughing it up in the last few moments, held on for our 10th win of the season.
Eddie had a full cast of characters (it's an analogy for his players donchaknow) for the first time all season, resulting in no one playing 35 minutes. I think I like that approach more, as long as he keeps some of the starters in there with the reserves. Speaking of the reserves, they basically won the game for us. Jason Smith had a great run in 8 minutes of play, Jrue Holiday was +17 in 11 minutes, Willie Green dished out 6 assists, and Rodney Carney nailed three key 3's to spark a huge Sixers run. Elton Brand, who I don't count as a bench player as he led the team in minutes, had another efficient game going 7-11 with 7 boards and no turnovers. For a team that usually relies too heavily on its starters, improved bench production and rotations by Jordan could go a long way in winning some more ball games.
Because Samuel Dalembert decided to use all of his fouls as quickly as possible, he was out of the game 3 minutes in with already 3 fouls. He later fouled out in under 20 minutes of action. Because EJ had Elton at center for much of the game running a small lineup, we lost the rebounding battle by 9. They did force more turnovers and limit the three, and while they did decently on the defensive end, still gave up 105 points, which is, pathetically, close to average for this team.
Iverson played well, Williams, Young and Iguodala were mostly absent, but the point is we beat a very undermanned team, only by 3 points. Nothing to celebrate over. And for those of you who still harp on about Ty Lawson, the guy who could never play in the pro game put up 23 points on 13 shots with 9 assists and 0 turnovers.
Oh, and we haven't lost in a year.