Philadelphia 76ers: Doc Rivers needs a new buzzer-beater play

As things presently stand, the Philadelphia 76ers are an average NBA team.

Gone are the days where the team could match up against any foe and take things to a Game 7 quadruple-doink at the end of regulation. Heck, the team can’t even just front-run their way to the best record in the East anymore, even if their effectiveness dried up once games slowed down at the end of a contested regulation period.

No, regardless of whether the Sixers win or lose any given game, their current points differential, 26, is the worst they’ve recorded since all the way back in 2016-17, when the team’s win-loss percentage was a not-so-good 34.1 percent.

Could that turn around in the not too distant future? Sure, but it’ll take quite a few lopsided wins to even reach 2019-20’s point differential of 174, let alone 2020-21’s 402, which ranks 10th all-time in franchise history.

But before the Philadelphia 76ers can start running up the score and get back to their winning ways, they need to close out tight games with a W next to the final score instead of an L. For that to happen, Doc Rivers really needs to come up with a new eight-second offensive play to get points on the board after inbounding the ball in the halfcourt, as the Sixers’ no-point guard look just isn’t working out.

The Philadelphia 76ers need a better end-of-game plan, stat.

Alright, allow me to set the stage.

After defensively rebounding a bricked 3 point shot by Kelly Oubre, Joel Embiid and the Philadelphia 76ers tied things up at 119-all with a 19-foot pull-up jumper. The Charlotte Hornets called a time-out, Doc Rivers subbed in Georges Niang for Seth Curry – which is just barely a defensive upgrade – and, after taking the clock down to 11 seconds, Miles Bridges missed a stepback 3 from 27 feet and afforded the Sixers one final opportunity to win the game outright.

Unsurprisingly, Rivers called a time out and drew up a play to get out of regulation with the W. Surprisingly, the play he drew up was remarkably similar to the one utilized versus the Boston Celtics, which resulted in the clock running out without taking a shot.

On that particular play, which came in a game where the entire rotation was effectively at full strength for the first time in weeks, Niang inbounded the ball to Tobias Harris, who got tied up by good defense from Al Horford and had to fire the ball back to Niang, who attempted a corner 3 just after the clock expired. What made that particular play unusual wasn’t necessarily that Harris was on the court or the decision to have Ninag inbound the ball. No, the really weird part was that Philly opted against having a point guard on the court and instead tasked Harris with getting the ball into the paint to Embiid, which ultimately didn’t happen.

In Charlotte, the Sixers once again opted against having a point guard on the court, though this time, it had more to do with Tyrese Maxey being out with a non-COVID illness than a weird coaching decision to have an extra shooter on the court. This time, the play actually went a little bit better, probably because the Hornets don’t have a Horford-level defender on their roster, but in the end, Embiid got the ball well outside of the restricted area and had to take a double-teamed jump shot in the hopes of coming away a hero.

Did the ball almost go in? Yes, but that has more to do with Embiid shooting a respectable 41.3 percent from the 10-16 range on the season than that attempt being a particularly high-percentage look.

Now granted, the Sixers were ultimately able to get out of “free basketball” with a win, and Embiid, who says he isn’t back to 100 percent health just yet, turned in his highest-scoring game of the season, but had just one thing gone Charlotte’s way in the final five minutes of regulation, where Embiid hit all three of the team’s three field goals, we’d be talking about a very different outcome.

So what can the Sixers do to fix these issues? Well, why not put the ball in Tyrese Maxey’s hands on such a play and task him with either scoring the ball on a drive or flipping the burden onto Embiid’s shoulder for a much higher-percentage shot within three feet of the basket, where “The Process” hits 73.7 percent of his shots and draws the lion’s share of his fouls? Worst case, the Sixers still fail to convert, but hey, at least they’d be attempting shots closer to the basket.

Fool me once; shame on you. Fool me twice; shame on me.

One day, maybe the Philadelphia 76ers will return to their front-running ways. Maybe the team will execute a trade – for CJ McCollum or otherwise – bring in some talent and finally have a perfect partner for Joel Embiid in the end-of-game two-man game. But until then, Doc Rivers has to put his players in better positions to succeed, especially when there are single-digit seconds left on the clock and the point differential is within one.