The last time we met the Blazers at home, it ended like this. One of the most exciting and incredible comebacks I ever saw.

Last night, it was a larger, encouraging win, 100-79, our fifth consecutive (18-20, .474), a season high – just like the ELEVEN THREES SCORED. And the 21 point margin marks the worst loss of the season for Portland.

Those are all good signs.

Evidences of a team that has (hopefully) turned a corner in its season, that is starting to play with confidence, as a unit, having added some new weapons and having re-discovered other, older, ones, that looked lost just some weeks ago.

Since Di Leo gave his players “the green light” to take more threes – an apparently idiotic move for the franchise that has been dead last in the NBA for months in this category, at 30% and even below that mark - shots suddenly started to fall.

The guido Sixers’ coach stated he would have liked to score five threes a game, and his players knocked down EIGHT on seventeen in the first half alone vs Portland. The score said 55-33 by then. That’s + 22, baby. 

But that fantastic, and even shocking, half time lead wasn’t built only on threes. It was the defense, the deflections, the steals, the ability to run whenever there was the chance, the usual lift provided by the guys off the bench (Williams, Evans, Speights…), the intensity, the unselfishness by everyone. 

You know, all those things that good NBA teams put on the floor to win basketball games, and that were Sixers’ trademarks last season.

We had an horrible third quarter, though, playing static, predictable offense, with poor circulation and some unforced turnovers. The first field goal came just after 6.30 minutes played, a dunk by Speights for the 59-48, to stop a 15-2 Blazers run.

On the following possession, Portland cut the deficit to only eight (59-51 on a three by Batum, 5.17 left) but we immediately went up sixteen after that (69-53) and put the game definitely out of reach for the Trail Blazers at the beginning of the fourth (83-63) in a stretch that included two threes by Young and a three point play by Ivey.

It can’t be a coincidence that our young players and substitutes OFTEN have those key baskets and plays in the key moments of the games: Speights knocked down also a nice jumper after the dunk descripted above, when the pressure for their comeback was rising. Sweet.

Spurs coming to Philly on Friday. The 1-5 road trip and those unbelievable losses @ Denver and @ San Antonio look so far now.

Elton Brand is close to make his comeback. Many think it could be a problem, I say “Welcome back dude, we need you”.

STAY TUNED ON S4G AS WE HAVE A GREAT INITIATIVE COMING UP IN FEW DAYS and we will need help from all of our readers and Sixers fans worldwide.

SIXERS4GUIDOS’ BONUS STATS AND RANDOM THOUGHTS: Forget those eleven threes, the most surprising stat to me is Evans’ OPEN (!) streak of NINE CONSECUTIVE FREE THROWS MADE, and his 63% for the season. He finished last year with 46% !! – Speaking of threes, we rose in the standings and are currently ranked 27 out of 30 teams with 32% – But, hear this, we shot 34/70 (49 % !!) from behind the arc in the last five, won, games – Iguodala was simply fantastic in the first quarter, closed with 14 points, connecting on a couple of threes – Two words for all of you: Shavlik. Randolph. - He played. And scored. Garbage time, yeah.

Yeah, that’s right: the end of the bench.

Phil Jasner is informing us that the 35 y/o forward will join the Sixers for the veteran minimum of 1.2 million.

Marshall should be known to every Sixers fan because of a memorable game of March 2005 in which he dropped TWELVE THREES on our team, then coached by Jim O’ Brien, to tie a NBA record and lead the Raptors to a 128-110 win. Enjoy our tough defense that night (click here if the video below doesn’t work):

Of course the current Donyell Marshall is far from being that effective (not to mention he won’t find similar horrid defenses…) but I think this is a good move. We didn’t have any real SF to back up Thaddeus Young (a solution there would have been switching Iguodala at the three, with Rush, Green or Williams at the two): Marshall can smoke weed hit a three, has playoffs experience and after all will barely play.

In such a young team some good veterans will have to play a role of teaching the game to their team mates, being a presence in the locker room and in practice, and being ready when there will be need.

Right now Sixer’s roster is set like this:

PG: Andre Miller/Louis Williams/Royal Ivey

SG: Andre Iguodala/Kareem Rush/Willie Green

SF: Thaddeus Young/Donyell Marshall

PF: Elton Brand/Reggie Evans, Marreese Speights

C: Sam Dalembert/Theo Ratliff + Jason Smith

That is a total of 14 players under contract: Jason Smith is out indefinitely so it’s more like 13 guys. Only twelve can dress up for a game, and this could mean that Cheeks will have to keep one of the aforementioned out. I think at the beginning of the season it could be Ivey or Speights to wear a suit instead of the Sixers uniform.

I am not worried at all for this, and if you think that last year we had Kevin Ollie, Calvin “His uglyness”  Booth and Louis Amundson in the spots now covered by Ivey, Theo and Marshall, you should realize how big of an improvement Sixers made also at the end of the bench.

Welcome Donyell, let’s see how many threes you can hit playing FOR the Sixers !

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I don’t know if there are Reggie Evans groupies yet. If not, time to create a group of them.

Evans, a reborn Dalembert and Andre Miller were – in this order, to me – our key players in the 95-75 unexpected thrashing of the Pistons in game 3.

This means few things:

1) my 4-1 Pistons prediction is already off the mark (and I love it, of course…)

2) young Sixers are psychologically more solid and mature than we all thought, bouncing back from the blow out of game 2 and answering it with another blow out. This against a veteran team that was supposed to regain the lead of the series, also mentally I mean, after the “distraction” of game 1. It didn’t happen, I see.

3) Pistons might still win the series, of course, but after these three games they are actually closer to a memorable collapse than to a “routine” advancement to the second round. Some signs (looks, faces, body language etc) should worry a lil bit their hot fans.

4) the most worrying fact for Detroit should be that Sixers are up 2-1 with their best player completely out of the series. Andre Iguodala had another bad game last night, but we still won, with no real struggles. This tells us a lot about the team’s capability to find other solutions, with different players stepping up. The only Reggie Evans (+ the wonderful Thaddeus Young, but with less impact) has played very well all three games

5) Billups – a player I am a big fan of - the heart, the soul and the brain of the Pistons, has been completely outplayed by Andre Miller so far, and Pistons bench has never left a sign on the games. Twentyfive turnovers is an impressive stat for a team like Detroit, that averaged only 11 in the regular season (#1 in the NBA).

Few flashes from all periods.

In the FIRST QUARTER Sixers started with a 6-0 run, and Pistons first possessions were an airball (Mc Dyess) and a bad turnover (Billups). Pistons stayed in the game because Tayshaun Prince was very effective on both ends of the floor, scoring at will and pushing Iguodala to take bad, forced shots from the perimeter. Andre, take it to the rim please….

Reggie Evans sparked us in the SECOND QUARTER, stripping Rasheed and going coast to coast to draw a foul and, later, scoring on an (unlikely, let’s be honest !!) fallaway jumper. Sam Dalembert gave him a lot of help, including a nice jump hook and a sweet mid range jumper.

But Sixers built their win in the pivotal THIRD QUARTER, starting hot and connecting on all of their first four shots: it was 56-46 when Thaddeus Young made a pair from the line with 8.30 to play. Hamilton’s fourth foul anticipated a sequence by Reggie Evans that made me scream of joy: offensive foul drawn by Wallace, 2/2 from the line, another offensive foul drawn by Prince: the crowd went wild (in the picture). Iguodala capped that with a layup for the 64-50.

Pistons started a streak of consecutive misses that reached fourteen (!!) and that continued also in the beginning of the FOURTH QUATER, until a goaltending called on Evans ended it at seventeen (!!!!!). Too late, because Carney had already scored the first four points of the period (74-55), a lead that Miller quicky lifted over twenty with a coast to coast (78-57, 9 minutes to go).

Then the fun began, with Sam Dalembert dunking everything, Lou Williams completing nice plays and even Shavlik Randolph scoring the first playoffs points of his career.

What a night !!

SIXERS4GUIDOS BONUS STATS AND RANDOM THOUGHTS

I didn’t check but I’m pretty sure Pistons shot 8/35 in the second half, with two field goals coming in the last minutes of garbage time – Mc Dyess had to leave the game with a broken nose with the score at 56-46: Iguodala accidentally hit him – Thaddeus Young was hit in the nose as well, after a hard foul by Maxiell – The only thing that makes me nervous is the fact that we are making a favor to the Celtics… even getting the Pistons tired, I mean, reguardless of the final outcome of the series – No sell out ????? 18.805 fans is pretty disappointing… they were loud, though.

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REGULAR season, I mean.

It ended with the 115-109 loss in Charlotte, the fourth straight, that kept us under .500 (40-42, .488).

Big deal? No, it was a fantastic run, and this young, exciting, athletic Sixers team probably overachieved, thanks mainly to the wonderful job done by Maurice Cheeks, a guy I bashed on these pages many times. Time to apologize again.

Some of you would perhaps remember I predicted 31 wins, but hundreds of ”colleagues” (in the category I put journalists, experts, bloggers, fans) were more around the 24-28 W range, with Sixers finishing from last to second last in the Eastern Conference.

So I won’t complain about these final four games, even if I would have preferred to take at least this last one, in order to avoid finishing with a losing record and to build some momentum before the playoffs (starting on Sunday at Detroit).

Cheeks rested most of his starters last night, with only Iguodala logging his usual minutes. Sixers were down 23 in the third (76-53, after a three pointer by Jason Richardson) but rallied back and closed the quarter 87-80 thanks to a 12-2 run with five consecutive points by an active Thaddeus Young and an alley oop dunk by Willie Green (season high 27 – in the picture, getting a rare S4G front page honour ) right at the buzzer.

The fourth quarter was interesting, three consecutive three pointers – two by Iguodala, one by Green – cut the deficit to three (97-94), two (99-91) and one point (101-100). Proud Sixers even gained the lead twice, first when Young closed a fastbreak with an easy layup (103-104) then when Iguodala knocked down Sixers’ tenth three pointer of the night (!!), 106-107.

Unfortunately in the last two minutes our defense allowed a couple of easy baskets and Jason Smith had three costly mistakes: he missed both free throws with Charlotte up one (110-109, 1.09 to play), then coulnd’t finish under the basket after Carroll extended Bobcats lead to three (112-109), and finally fouled Felton on the last offensive play for Charlotte, allowing the “and one” that closed the game at 115-109 with five seconds left. It will be a learning experience for our rookie, a player I really like, by the way.

Time to think about the Pistons, then. I repeat, I think Detroit will win the series 4-1, but all games will be close. First because the Pistons rarely rip (no pun intended) their opponents, playing at a slow tempo, second because Sixers apparently found a way to win some games against a team that for the last 3-4 years literally toyed with us. 

Sixers and Pistons split the regular season series (2-2), and even if the last win at the Wachovia center came against a team that had its starters watch for most of the game, our guys were able to steal one in the D earlier, one of the (many) turning points of this surprising Sixers weason.

Brian/Depressed fan has a suggestion for Mo Cheeks that I agree with. Unfortunately, it won’t happen. Willie will remain in the starting line up. But usually he plays well versus his home town team so let’s be positive !

A guidoesque breakdown of the Detroit series will follow before game 1, together with a post celebrating Mo Cheeks (any seat left in the bandwagon? LOL).

SIXERS4GUIDOS BONUS STATS AND RANDOM THOUGHTS

Dudley airballed a free throw in the third… no, not Chris, Jared Dudley !! – Sammy had five offensive rebounds in the first quarter – Amundson blew a layup for the possible 93-91 in the fourth – Matt Carroll looked like the best Dan Majerle in the first half, when he had 15 points – The finest Bobcats blog Queen City hoops hasn’t posted its recap yet… do guys there care at all? – Bobcats were without Gerald Wallace, Sean May, Adam Morrison – Sixers were with Kevin Ollie, though – Shavlik Randolph saw some action and had a couple of nice plays before injuring his hand !! – Redlasso rocks, thanks again Joe.

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Sixers played ten minutes of embarassing basketball, had a nice reaction that lasted around four minutes, which was followed by thirtyfour, painful minutes of garbage time.

That’s the short story of the 113-95 loss at Orlando, that put us at 34-35 (.493). Call it “reality check”, “awakening”, “step back” etc etc, that’s it.

And don’t get fooled by the boxscore, the game was NOT that ‘close’ (LOL).

Sixers were completely outplayed basically from start to finish and in every possible way.

It started 4-0 with two dunks by Dwight Howard, both off Nelson’s assists, then 12-4 with Magic hitting all of their first five shots, then 20-6, then 25-8 when Evans (it was Maurice, don’t worry…) knocked down the fifth three pointer out of five attempts for the Magic, in your typical “pick your poison” situation.

Either Howard was getting a dunk or an easy basket (see the picture) or one of Orlando perimeter players was draining an open jumper.

Sixers defense was simply non existent, while the offense was atrocious, with missed layups, forced plays resulting in turnovers or offensive fouls (a ton of them, for the whole game), various bricks.

After the center put Magic up by twentytwo with an “and one” play (33-11 with 2.46 left !!) Sixers had a little reaction, sparked by Reggie Evans and Lou Williams, to close the quarter on a 8-0 run (33-19), that became 12-0 at the beginning of the second (33-23).

Nevermind: Orlando went on its own 8-0 run and the game was over at 41-23, 7.12 left. Good night. The rest of the game was so ugly for us that it’s not even worth reporting, with deficits always around the 30 point mark.

Just few flashes to give you the idea:

* how about four fouls in one single Magic possession, three of them on Dalembert ? It happened in the second quarter

* how about an airball by Iguodala immediately after the aforementioned three point play by Howard that gave the Magic a 22 point lead in the first?

* how about Iguodala, Green and Carney (“shooting” guards….) combining for 0/6 on free throws in three different trips to the line? My feeling is Sixers need an exorcist to solve this problem, more than a coach.

I would like to add some points:

1) Lou Williams was the top scorer but he played a HORRIBLE game in my opinion, going many times one-on-five, showing selfishness and poor basketball IQ at the same time. Mo has to talk to the guy, seriously.

I don’t know how many possessions ended with him taking an ill advised shot with nobody else even sniffing the ball… Yeah, he sparked that little run and eventually filled the stat sheet but he was detrimental to the TEAM at the end of the day. Awful.

2) Green played one of his old “garbage time” games, with his good part of forced shots, missed layups, offensive fouls. Terrible.

2) Iguodala & Miller were on the same, subpar level: you look at the boxscore and you think they weren’t so bad, but they were nowhere to be found when it counted.

3) Dalembert got embarassed one more time by Dwight Howard, who buried the game playing less than 23 minutes (LOL). I guess Howard bounced back after the poor performance vs Wizards. Sam, to put it simple, can’t guard him playing one-on-one.

In general, I noticed NO CIRCULATION, POOR SPACING, LACK OF EXECUTION, that was one of the reason for the many turnovers and offensive fouls: our guys didn’t know what to do with the ball and stubbornly continued trying to drive to the basket, even when the defense didn’t allow it.

Let’s not even talk about what happened in OUR half court: 14/23 from behind the arc for the Magic, 53% on field goals should be enough.

Reggie Evans was the best Sixer last night, but of course he can’t singlehandedly lead us anywhere: he can be the spark, but then fire should follow, by the team.

Ouh, one more thing: officiating was really bad. Needless to say, it had NOTHING to do with our loss.

SIXERS4GUIDOS BONUS STATS AND RANDOM THOUGHTS

Speaking of embarassment, we let Pat Garrity score on a low post move… - Our first defensive possession after half time wasn’t bad either: we were supposed to play some full court pressure but allowed Turkoglu to drive all the way to our basket, where he stopped and assisted Rashard Lewis for an easy jumper. Nice way to change momentum after the break – The mighty JJ Redick found a way to turn the ball over three times in garbage time – Shavlik Randolph scored his first points of the season, the only good note in the night - Guys over at Third Quarter collapse are probably drooling at the idea of finding us in the first round of the playoffs: Magic closed the regular season series 3-1, with all the wins coming in form of blowouts.

Let’s turn the page quickly: Sixers meet the Nets tonight and have a chance to show this one was only “one of those nights” vs one of our rivals for a playoffs spot.

Time to finish my rates with our big men

I am writing these BS.. pardon, lines, while waiting for the lottery draft, let’s hope the first italian Sixers blog brings some good luck, and that we can land another quality big man, God knows how much we need him. So:

SAM DALEMBERT

As soon as I was about to quit on our starting center (here pictured in a funny mismatch), he started playing really good.

So much for my basketball knowledge…

He really had a nice season, and finally showed some real improvements. Impressive the one from the free throw line, where he ended with an excellent 74% . Better than, say, Willie Green’s 66%…

Sam finished with 11 + 9 + 2, with 54% FG. Also reduced his fouls (!). Started being consistent, built a nice jumper from middle range. Put a strong, rebounding PF beside him and we’re ok for the next 2-3 years.

A good addition for my fantasy team, too.

Rate: 7

STEVEN HUNTER

The fact that Sixers actually improved with Steven Hunter in the starting line up tells us a lot about how much we sucked….

Nothing against him, but he would be nothing than a 15 minutes back up center for any serious NBA team. In Philly, he had to start. Another Ollie case, I say.

Perhaps the poorest rebounder inch-by-inch I have ever seen. Yes, very athletic, yes a good shot blocker, yes, a center who can fill the lanes on a fast break.

But bad defender and awful from the free throw line, which is something I really hate (each of us has his own fetish, right?). 

Rate: 6

JOE SMITH

Nice surprise,  I have to admit.

I thought he was done when he came back to Philly in the Iverson trade, and saw him only as an expriring contract. Now I would be ok with extending that contract (for cheap, ok? But it depends also on the ping pong bolls… we’ll see in few minutes). 

He showed he can still play: a decent defender, decent rebounder, can hit big shots, makes his free throws.

Good locker room presence, they say. I have to believe that, savy veterans are much needed in a young team. A keeper in my book. Not for Derrick Coleman’s money, though. What about 2 years, 5 mill?

Rate: 7

CHRIS WEBBER

A total asshole in Philly, very good in Detroit. I blame Cheeks more than him for this, but he has to take his part.

Let’s hope Duncan kicks his ass in the Finals, he definitely doesn’t deserve a ring. And this coming from a fan of him (well, at least I USED to be one)

Rate: 4 

ALAN HENDERSON

Not bad for a 11th man, he had some good games whene the team was depleted. Larry Brown would have loved him and given him a 5 years deal. Ah, veterans…

Rate: 6

SHAVLIK RANDOLPH

Was doing pretty good before he went down, but in a team that was a total mess, so I would wait a little bit longer before saying he’s worth something. He showed some pride and will to fight, I loved the attitude.

Let’s hope he can recover after that terrible injury. If Willie Green did it… (damn, this was bad…)

Rate: 6

End of a four posts report.

(Previous ones: GM and coach – Back court – Swingmen)