Sixers Win First Home Game, Break Internet

By Sean Kennedy (@PhillyFastBreak)

Philadelphia 95, Cleveland 92 – Box Score

The Sixers were in the midst of a huge 14-4 run in the fourth quarter, eventually tying the game at 88. Unfortunately for those who relish enjoying such moments amongst fellow fans in the Sixers twitter community, this was also about that time the social network’s streaming service experienced an outage that threw the world 10 years into the past. Apparently any action that led toward Philadelphia earning its first home win in 15 tries threw a figurative monkey wrench into the logic components of the world’s preeminent 140-character conversation starter.

Things got back to normal in the virtual world right around the time Tony Wroten dropped 2 of his team-high 20 points with 9 seconds left to put the Sixers up by a single point. Wroten was a beast down the stretch, scoring 9 points in the final 4 minutes of the game, and finishing with 8 assists as well. Wroten’s assist total should have been even better, as a few of his 5 turnovers were spectacular passes that hit his teammates in the hands under the basket, but were dropped instead of being finished for easy points. None of those miscues mattered in the end though, as after Wroten put the Sixers back up top, Matthew Dellavedova missed an off-balance scoop shot and a Wells Fargo crowd that had largely bought tickets in hopes of seeing King James, instead celebrating the crowning of the Sixers as victors.

The game was certainly there for the taking, as the Cavaliers were running a skeleton crew out against the Sixers Monday night. We knew heading into the game that both LeBron James (knee) and Kyrie Irving (back) would be sitting out, leaving Cleveland minus three of their original starters with Anderson Varejao already out for the season following achilles surgery. However, fans were also thrown a curveball when news broke right before tip-off that Dion Waiters had left the bench area and was unavailable. Word continued to leak out over the course of the evening that Waiters was part of a huge three-team deal, with the Philly native heading to the Thunder and the Cavs getting Iman Shumpert and J.R. Smith. With Lou Amundson and Alex Kirk also part of the deal, Cleveland was left with just 4 bench players available, forcing them to juggle their lineup and do things like give a bit player like James Jones a season-high 27 minutes.

Still, the Cavs had one remaining member of the new Big Three in uniform, and Kevin Love did his best to shoulder the load, recording game-highs of 28 points and 19 rebounds. The Sixers frequently went with a small-ball lineup and tried to front the post against Love with a shorter defender. More often than not, they had to resort to fouling him, and Love made them pay by hitting 11-13 from the charity stripe. Fellow big man Tristan Thompson also had a strong effort on the glass, collecting 9 rebounds to go with his 18 points, 9 of which came during Cleveland’s 14-0 run in the second quarter to build their big lead.

For the Sixers, after sitting out the Clippers game to rest a sore shoulder, Michael Carter-Williams returned with one of his better games of the season. The point guard finished with 18 points, 6 rebounds, and 13 assists, but most importantly, committed just a single turnover. The Sixers didn’t turn the ball over once in the fourth quarter, which was the biggest reason they were able to climb back into the game, and spoke to how well both he and Wroten played in crunch time. Also helping out on the offensive end was Robert Covington, who continued to shoot fireballs by hitting 4-7 threes for 16 points. Covington has now hit a three in 17 consecutive games, and is knocking down triples at a rate of 43.5% on the season; what a find.

The Sixers will next look to earn their second-winning streak of the season Wednesday night against the Bucks. Milwaukee has already lost star rookie Jabari Parker for the season due to injury and has the team’s would-be starting center telling management he doesn’t want to play basketball anymore. It’s a great opportunity for the Sixers to keep things rolling, and hopefully we’ll be able to discuss a terrific Sixers performance online for a full 48 minutes.