76ers overcome mass turnover issues to defeat Heat in Game 4
Ben Simmons dressed quickly after he became the first rookie to record a triple-double in the NBA playoffs since Magic Johnson. The visiting locker room in Miami can get as humid and thick as the South Florida air outside. authentic nfl jerseys And after the Philadelphia 76ers beat the Heat 106-102 Saturday afternoon to take a commanding 3-1 series lead in this first-round matchup, it was extra crowded, and extra hot, backstage.
Simmons read the situation just as he reads the court -- quickly and effortlessly -- put on his dark gray shirt and headed to the much cooler podium room before most of his teammates were back at their lockers. Veteran move for a 21-year-old.
It's easy to forget how young these Sixers still are sometimes with the way they've been rolling over the past two months. Philadelphia has now won 19 of its past 20 games (including a 17-game win streak). But none of those wins was as improbable as the game they flat-out stole from the Heat on Saturday night.
"I was shocked that we won this game," Sixers coach Brett Brown told ESPN after the contest. "The fourth quarter was good to us. But the first three periods were terrible.
"It's unheard of to win a game with 27 turnovers. A playoff game, let alone a game. But we found a way to win in the fourth period. The exciting thing is ... we have so much more to grow and give. We have so much more to grow and give."
Brown's eyes lit up as he repeated that last line. He was an assistant coach in San Antonio when the Spurs were building their dynasty around Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili. He often has talked to his players about how they'll need to learn to win and grow together -- just as those three future Hall of Famers did. There is no substitute for experience. No coaching that can harden and sharpen a team like the playoffs.
But the more these playoffs go on, and the more these Sixers' talents keep shining against this veteran, savvy, hard-nosed Heat team, the more you start to wonder if Philadelphia might just be precocious enough to win now.
But maybe that's why this is working so far. You see, these Sixers are eminently more talented than those old Spurs teams. Simmons and Joel Embiid are generationally significant talents. Dario Saric would be the best player on many other teams. nfl jerseys wholesale Only Robert Covington and T.J. McConnell fit the Spurs' mode of overlooked college players who developed to become valuable pieces on a contender.
