Tyrese Maxey praises depth, fight Sixers showed in loss to Nuggets
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The Philadelphia 76ers had the odds stacked against them on Monday night when they paid a visit to Ball Arena to take on the Denver Nuggets. The Sixers were missing both Joel Embiid and James Harden and it was a night that was expected to be a wash for them.
In a way, it was as Denver built up a 22-point lead on its way to a 116-111 win, but the players at the end of the bench showed a lot of fight. With the Nuggets leading by 20 in the fourth quarter, coach Doc Rivers emptied the bench, but those players had other plans with their minutes rather than running out the clock.
A group led by Jalen McDaniels, Jaden Springer, Furkan Korkmaz, Montrezl Harrell, and a combination of Shake Milton and Danuel House Jr. worked its way back into the game and the deficit was cut to just three with less than 30 seconds to go. The Nuggets eventually closed it out, but the heart and the depth shown were encouraging.
“I feel like we fought,” Tyrese Maxey told reporters. “That group at the end, they fought their tails off at the end to get back in it. I think what we can take from this is in the first half we were in the game big time.”
Philadelphia received 14 points from McDaniels, Paul Reed had 16 points on 7-for-7 shooting with nine rebounds, House Jr. added eight points, and the Sixers were able to see how deep they are.
“One thing we can take from this is how deep we are,” Maxey continued. “Guys like House, who hasn’t played in a couple games, comes in and contributes. P Reed had a hell of a game. De’Anthony (Melton) started. The list goes on and on, you know what I mean? So, I think that’s one thing that we can take from this.”
The Sixers could have re-inserted their starters when the deficit got cut to single digits, but they decided not to. Maxey, who had 29 points, watched from the bench as his teammates attempted to pull off a shocker.
“I’m always going to support my teammates at any point in the game, especially at the end,” Maxey finished. “When guys like Jaden Springer, who hasn’t played much this year, they’re out there fighting and competing extremely hard. They’re out there playing and performing. They were getting the lead down, and that was exciting.”
With that being said, the Sixers have now lost three games in a row. As they return home from one grueling stretch in the schedule, they will need to bounce back when they host the Dallas Mavericks on Wednesday.
