Mudiay and Universe Conspire to Beat the Sixers

By Sean Kennedy (@PhillyFastBreak)

Denver 104, Philadelphia 103 – Box Score

There have been plenty, I mean plenty, of times this season where the Philadelphia 76ers deserved to lose. They’ve played lethargic defense, committed dumb turnovers, made poor decisions and taken awful shots. And there was certainly a fair share of those things Wednesday night in Denver. Still, they did not deserve to lose this game. Not like this.

Emmanuel Mudiay must’ve caught the March Madness fever with this buzzer-beater last night. https://t.co/dJsVI5VrXL https://t.co/HMCWwolzDD

— SB Nation NBA (@SBNationNBA) March 24, 2016

That’s Emmanuel Mudiay (game-high 27 points), stumbling through three defenders while almost coughing up the ball, hitting the longest shot of his career from 36 feet to beat the Sixers at the buzzer. It’s not quite Northern Iowa banking in a half-court shot to win the game, but it’s as close to March Madness as you’re going to find this month at the NBA level.

Sometimes, they say it’s better to be lucky than good. For the Sixers, it’s terrible to be unlucky and bad.

While that sinks in, let’s back it up to how those teams arrive at that late-game situation. The Sixers went on an astounding 17-0 run in the first quarter to take a double-digit lead. TJ McConnell played a big part in that surge; he was excellent all game with 17 points on 7-10 shooting and 5 assists in just 20 minutes. His strong play was even more noticeable because of how terrible Ish Smith was once again. In what’s become commonplace lately, Smith couldn’t hit anything, finishing 1-9 from the field. He also played his usual terrible defense (hence, Mudiay’s 27 points, three shy of a career-high).

Naturally, the Sixers blew that lead by scoring a total of 10 points in the second quarter. But to their credit, they continued battling all game long. They received a boost from the return of Robert Covington and Richaun Holmes from injury. Both players performed well, with Covington tallying 16 points and 9 rebounds, and Holmes adding 6 points and 4 rebounds in 14 minutes. Carl Landry also played very well in place of Nerlens Noel (late scratch with a minor knee injury), recording 16 points and 7 rebounds in 24 minutes.

So when Philadelphia went on an 8-0 run late in the fourth quarter to give the Sixers a five-point lead, it seemed like they were going to pull this one out. They would finally grab that elusive 10th win, avoiding matching the NBA-worst 9-73 record over an 82-game season.

Then, they scored one point over the final 1:52 of the game. It was a sequence that featured terrible shots in the form of a fadeaway jumper from Ish Smith, an iso for Canaan for some reason, and a Robert Covington rush job from 25 feet at the end of the shot clock. Between that and the decision for Covington not to miss his second free throw on purpose with under 3 seconds left (Denver did not have a timeout left), there was no more ammunition for the “Is Brett Brown a terrible late-game tactician?” group.

The players are tired of the losing. The fans are tired of the losing. Apparently, the universe is not.

Philadelphia’s next shot at avoiding 9-73 comes Saturday in Portland.