Poor coaching at heart of Philadelphia 76ers loss to Rockets

The Philadelphia 76ers suffered a heart-breaking loss to the Houston Rockets on Wednesday. Brett Brown’s poor coaching was at the heart of it.

The Philadelphia 76ers led the Houston Rockets for most of the second half in their game on Wednesday night. They lost the lead at the buzzer thanks to Eric Gordon, but the team had plenty of chances to seal the deal throughout. Coach Brett Brown and some unfortunate turnovers were at fault for letting the Rockets stay close during the game.

First off, there were at least four plays throughout the game that ended with a rushed shot as the shot clock ticked down close to zero. Brett Brown’s playcalling was pretty bad all night. For the Sixers’ last possession of the game, he had his team run an isolation for Ben Simmons. Simmons is the team’s most reliable ball-handler, but literally everyone in the Wells Fargo Center knew what he was going to do with the ball when he got it on the inbound.

When healthy and confident, Markelle Fultz will probably be the man to take the last shot when needed because he proved in college that he could score from all three levels. That’s assuming that his injury caused his current jump shot, or lack thereof. Joel Embiid or J.J. Redick would have kept the defense guessing on Wednesday on that last possession.

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Embiid and Redick can score from all three levels, even though they can’t handle the ball as well as Simmons, the Rockets’ defense would have been guessing as to where those two players would have shot from. That said, the fact Brown called an isolation play with less than a minute left shows laziness and lack of creativity at a time where the Sixers just needed a bucket.

Brett Brown didn’t have anyone crash the offensive boards for the majority of the game, which made the Philadelphia 76ers look scared of the Rockets offense. Clint Capela ended with 20 rebounds, and 14 of them coming on the defensive end of the floor. The Sixers didn’t contest most of those rebounds. Amazingly, Philly outrebounded Houston 43-40, but if the Sixers showed more aggression on the offensive glass, they could have scored a few second-chance points and won the game.

Brown showed off his stubbornness when he looked to his bench: rather than play Jahlil Okafor when Amir Johnson struggled, he decided to put in Dario Saric as a small-ball center. Johnson scored four points and grabbed seven rebounds in 16 minutes, and replacing him with Saric proved to be a horrific decision because Saric ended with zero points on one shot attempt and two rebounds in 17 minutes on the floor. What’s worse is the fact that Brown thought replacing Johnson with him would help the team.

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The 6-10, 223 pound Saric could not hang with Tarik Black or Capela in the post. If Brown substituted Okafor in the game so he could get buckets in the post, the NCAA Champion’s agility on offense would frustrate the two big men. His moves on the low block would put them in more foul trouble: Capela committed four fouls and Black committed five as a result of guarding Embiid.

Brown tried to cover for the lack of strength down low by giving Justin Anderson 19 minutes. He scored eight points on a respectable 3-7 shooting, but he posted a plus/minus of -13, which tied Ben Simmons for the worst tally on the team in the one-point loss. He grabbed just three rebounds and five out of his seven shots were from three, so he didn’t add much of a strong presence on the offensive side of the floor.

It was frustrating to watch the Sixers give away their lead and lose at the buzzer in the manner they did, and it was equally tough to see Brown mismanage all the talent he has at his fingertips. During the Process, poor tactical coaching from Brett Brown has been an unfortunate trend, but as the team grows together, Brown should get a better feel for the new additions to the team and how to maximize their strengths and play aggressively but not sloppily.