By Sam Amico
ProBasketballNews.com
Something has gotten into the Philadelphia 76ers, and it’s hard to tell what it is.
I mean, seriously, do you have any idea how these guys have won three straight -- including a 103-96 victory over defending champion San Antonio?
Whatever it is, it’s working. With a month left in the season, the Sixers (33-34) hold the No.7 playoff seed. They are also mere percentage points away from grabbing the fifth seed, now owned by Toronto.
But the Raptors’ success makes sense. They have a
bona fide star in Chris Bosh (when healthy), and
quality supporting players in Jose Calderon, T.J. Ford
and Andrea Bargnani.
The Sixers? Well, their entire roster is role players.
Point guard Andre Miller has always been pretty good.
He’s a veteran, a pro‘s pro, and a team-first guy all the way.
Also, swingman Andre Iguodala has All-Star potential -- but is still somewhat inconsistent and seems more suited to be a second option for a good team than to play a starring role.
Other than those two, the Sixers are a hodgepodge of youth (Thaddeus Young, Louis Williams, Rodney Carney) and solid-but-unspectacular experience (Reggie Evans, Samuel Dalembert).
Their starting shooting guard used to be Allen Iverson, one of the most talented and celebrated individuals ever to man the position. Their starting shooting guard today? Willie Green.
Green is a nice young fellow who is in his fifth season, all in Philadelphia. He’s started in each of the Sixers’ first 58 games and is averaging a career-high 13.0 points.
In other words, Green isn’t exactly the second coming of Andrew Toney. But like the rest of this team, Green gets the job done with hustle, unselfishness, and sheer determination.
Still, there really is no easy way to explain how these Sixers are throwing a nightly scare into opponents, how they are playing their best basketball of the season when it means the most.
As the always-polite and soft-spoken Miller said after win over San Antonio, "We’re just playing some good basketball, especially this month. We've held our own and everyone's doing a good job.”
Sounds simple, but how else do you expect this basketball mystery to be described?
Of course, a lot of the credit must go to coach Maurice Cheeks -- a man whose job was said to be on shaky ground when the season began.
But Cheeks is proving to be this era’s version of Lenny Wilkens; a former point guard who displayed the poise, confidence and intelligence to coach as a player. Like Wilkens, Cheeks understands how to relate to pro athletes. He’ll never be a Bobby Knight-like screamer (far from it), but he doesn’t cater to anyone or anything, either. He just institutes a philosophy and makes it work.
Also like Wilkens, Cheeks especially seems to get the most from his point guards. That could especially be seen in the win over San Antonio -- when Miller scored a game-high 32 points, making 11 of 14 field goals despite playing with a bad back.
Prior to the Spurs game, the Sixers won by a point in Detroit and overcame an 18-point deficit to win by four in Chicago. Both are the types of victories you look back at and say, “That’s when we really started to believe good things could happen.”
If the playoffs began today, the Sixers would face the Pistons in the first round. If they climb a spot, they’d play Orlando. Two spots would mean Cleveland (or possibly Toronto).
Basically, we all know the East is wide open. So no matter where the Sixers land in the postseason, they’ve displayed the type of composure and toughness that make you believe anything is possible.
And when it comes to these Sixers, whoever would’ve believed that at the beginning of the year?
