76ers vs. Pistons Playoff Series: Philly BLOWS Game 4

OK, guys, I just got back from the Sixers game tonight, and I am still a little hot by the way they played in the second half. This game was the classic tale of two halves, and the 76ers picked the wrong one to show up for. Best way to describe this game is - missed opportunity. They had the Pistons by the balls, and tonight was the game they needed to squeeze the crap out of them. Instead they let a dangerous Detroit team right back into this series giving the home court advantage right back to the Pistons.

What’s so frustrating is how they can play a near-perfect half of basketball then never really come back out of the locker room after halftime. How did they take a 46-36 lead into the half? The defense was phenomenal. Everyone contested every single shot the Pistons took. They helped each other out when a teammate got beat, and the rotations were flawless. That defensive intensity held Detroit to only 36 first half points and 37.5% shooting. Unfortunately, the first half is all they decided to play.

Thoughts from the game

• I have never in my life heard and seen a crowd go as nuts as the Sixers fans did when Andre Iguodala hit his first jumper. That in of itself should tell you how bad he is playing right now.
• Reggie Evans came back to Earth and had his worst game of the series. In 19 minutes he had 2 points, 3 rebounds and 3 turnovers. What’s worst was his horrendous defense especially on the pick and pop. Evans looked like a chicken with his head cut off, literally running around in circles trying to find his man. He was completely lost, like he didn’t know his rotations, and that left Rasheed and McDyess wide open for easy jump shot after easy jump shot. And they nailed them. Sheed’s three’s were like daggers to the heart in the 3rd quarter.
• Jason Smith played great in limited action in the first half.
• The fans didn’t come back for the beginning of the second half which didn’t help the Sixers cause as the Pistons started out on fire.
• At first glance I thought the Sixers were horrible from the free throw line. But in actuality it was really just Andre Iguodala who sucked. Take his 4-9 out and the rest of the team shot 83% from the line. Take out Iguodala’s dismal 4-16 shooting the rest of the 76ers shot a whopping 53% from the field. Why his this dude still shooting? Why did he play 46 freakin’ minutes? Your guess is as good as mine.
• The Pistons came out in the second half and played their style of ball. Physical on defense and methodical on offense. Their traps on the pick and roll were suffocating and helped force 11 Sixers turnovers in the second half. On offense they went in to Sheed, ran Hamilton off 15 million screens (by the way, respect Rip Hamilton! He is easily the best off-the-ball offensive player in the NBA), and ran the pick and pop with Billups and Sheed to perfection.
• I have read a bunch of people ripping Samuel Dalembert. Why? He had 12 points, 12 boards shot 6-6 from the line and all on only 5 shot attempts! He didn’t get the open 15-footers because Detroit made the necessary adjustments. Like I said their traps were better and that allowed better rotation to the shooters. And it wasn’t Sammy that Sheed was scoring on; it was Evans. In the first half Sheed was only 2-6 with Dalembert on him much of that time. He was 0-2 in the fourth quarter with Sammy defending. It was the third quarter he went off, when Reggie was in the game.
• Key moment in the 4th quarter came when we were down 13 points and finally stopped Rip from scoring on great defense by Willie Green forcing an air ball. That started the break where Andre Iguodala bulled right into Hamilton, who actually got back after his air ball unlike Iggy did in the previous game. Took the charge and likely ended the Sixers comeback push.
• Finally, why the hell did Cheeks take Willie Green out of the game with 3:36 remaining after he had just broke down Rip for two straight layups? Answer: to put in a rookie (Rodney Carney) for a designed play to get a three. Bad coaching In my opinion. 1. Why go away from the guy that is semi-hot? 2. Why run a designed play for a rookie in a pressure sitation when Green could have served the same purpose? The result was Carney forcing up a horrible three-point attempt that nearly broke the backboard. That’s what happens when an inexperienced player is asked to to do too much. Instead of realizing he didn’t have the shot and deviate, he acted like a robot went through with it even though it clearly wasn’t there.
• After the aforementioned situation I saw Willie Green, who was visibly pissed he was taken out, cheering the team on in the huddle and patting guys on the head spurring them on to not give up.  That was about all the leadership I could find in the game, and it came from the guy most Sixers fans despise.

Tracking Andre Iguodala

After the 76ers’ game 3 win I talked about Andre Iguodala’s offense. I don’t feel the need to repeat what I said already. Tonight he did nothing but further prove his inadequacies on offense.

Tayshaun Prince is 19-21 from the field in the last two games. Now as a basketball player the first thing I think when I see something like that is: “Who the hell is guarding that guy?” Answer: Andre Iguodala. So let’s talk about his defense real quick.

I will make another bold statement Sixers fans probably won’t like: Andre Iguodala is NOT one of the best defenders in the NBA. He is a decent defender at best, but nothing special by any means. And certainly not consistently good on the defensive end. I think people are still living in the past regarding his defense. When he first came in the league he was a very good defender with the potential to be great. Why? His role and his focus with the real AI on the team was to be a lock-down defender and help protect Iverson’s size disadvantage and gambling style of play. As his offensive responsibilities increased his defense has decreased in kind. He often takes plays off on defense (he definitely did tonight), and he doesn’t work very hard off the ball on defense at all. I think we can stop making excuses for Iguodala at this point. His man is having no problem scoring and playing shut-down defense on him at the same time. Simply put - Andre Iguodala is flat out getting exposed in all aspects of his game during this playoff series. And with that I bet he can see dollar signs quickly flying out of his next contract. As he should.

Unrelated to the team, let me just rant about the fans (if you can call them that) who sucked.

With the 76ers down 13 and just over 3 minutes remaining in the game half of the people (NOT FANS) began to leave the Wachovia Center. I was in complete shock when I saw this and since I was sitting in an end seat I started screaming at them “THERE ARE STILL 3 MINUTES LEFT” as they looked at me like I was the crazy one. Disgraceful. I was sitting in section 102 which is behind the Sixers’ bench, and I could see the players watching everyone filing out of the arena. As a player that is deflating and doesn’t make you look forward to coming home on Thursday when the home crowd blatantly gives up on you. We need to coin a new term for fans like that. Do you guys have any ideas?

I don’t know about you but I am already looking for tickets for game 6 on Thursday whether our team wins or loses on Tuesday in Detroit. I know what most people are doing. Waiting to see if they win in Detroit before they even consider buying tickets for game 6. Why? No faith, no belief and no confidence in the Sixers.

This is what happens when you only play 24 minutes of good basketball in the playoffs. I was amazed how fast our 10-point halftime lead disappeared in the blink of an eye. But let’s move on to the current situation. We are back to the beginning again. Now we have a 3-game series with Detroit holding the home court advantage. Steal one on the road again like they did in game one. (Note: I do not mean steal one from the almighty Detroit Pistons who are sooooo much better then our often called scrub Sixers.) Then come back Thursday and take care of business at home. The Sixers can beat them, but our guys need to put together full games and Cheeks has to make the necessary adjustments in order to do it.

Player of the Game: Thaddeus Young