3 – Stauskas Showing Severe Signs of Improvement
After a rough start to the season, Nik Stauskas has transformed into one of the Philadelphia 76ers’ most important bench players, and he’s improving every game.
Here are Stauskas’ per-game averages over the first seven games of the 2016-17 season:
6.4 points, 2.7 rebounds, 1.1 assists, 42.1 field goal percentage, 33.3 3-point percentage.
Here are Stauskas’ per-game averages over the next eight games of the 2016-17 season leading into Friday’s contest agains the Bulls:
13.1 points, 2.8 rebounds, 1.3 assists, 55.4 field goal percentage, 48.7 3-point percentage.
Simply put, his shooting and scoring have severely improved over the second half of Sixers’ schedule up to this point.
Because of his uptick in production, Brett Brown has raised Stauskas’ minutes from 23 per game up to 27 per game over this period.
On Friday, he was second on the team in scoring with 13 points, third in rebounds with 5, tied for a team-high 3 assists and blocked a team-best 3 shots in 24 minutes of action.
When the Sixers traded the Sacramento Kings for Stauskas in July 2015, they did so primarily for the pick-swaps and future first-round pick. Stauskas was just a former lottery selection that the organization felt was worth taking a chance on at the time.
With each passing game, it’s looking more and more like Stauskas was worth the risk.