Philly still hot, takes out Hawks
JJ Redick scored 28 points and the surging Philadelphia 76ers set a franchise record with their 15th consecutive victory, holding off the host Atlanta Hawks 121-113 last night to move a step closer to locking up the No. 3 seed in the Eastern Conference.
The 76ers overcame a tough night for rookie star Ben Simmons, who missed the morning shootaround after coming down with the stomach flu. He still managed to put up 13 points, 10 rebounds and six assists before fouling out with seven seconds remaining.
Simmons picked up a technical in the third quarter for arguing all the way down the court about a call that didn’t go his way.
His teammates helped pick up the slack. Redick hit 6-of-9 from beyond the 3-point arc, while former Atlanta players Ersan Ilyasova and Marco Belinelli burned their old team. Ilyasova scored 26 points, Belinelli added 20 and the duo combined for nine 3-pointers. Philadelphia went 17-of-37 beyond the arc.
Just two years removed from a 10-72 debacle, the 76ers can lock up the East’s third seed with a home victory over Milwaukee in the regular-season finale tonight. The rebuilding Hawks were long ago eliminated from playoff contention, closing out their worst season since 2005 with a record of 24-58.
Hornets 119, Pacers 93 — Dwight Howard finished with 14 points and 17 rebounds and Frank Kaminsky tied his career high with 24 points last night to lead visiting Charlotte past Indiana in Indianapolis.
Charlotte ended the season with two wins in its last seven games.
The Pacers, who are locked into the No. 5 seed in the Eastern Conference, lost for the second time in three games with three starters sitting out. Darren Collison, T.J. Leaf and Glenn Robinson III all scored 13 points for Indiana.
Suns 124, Mavericks 97 — Rookie Alec Peters scored a career-high 36 points and Phoenix beat host Dallas in a reserve-filled finale for two teams headed to the lottery.
The Mavericks (24-58) entered the game tied for the third-worst record in the NBA and stayed that way while sitting eight players.
Atlanta finished with the same record after losing at home to Philadelphia. Orlando can join the Mavericks and Hawks with a loss at home to Washington tonight.
Dirk Nowitzki will play for the Mavericks next season. After that, who knows.
At a news conference before last night’s game, Nowitzki reiterated he wasn’t retiring but said: “It’s hard for me at this point to commit farther than one year and say one year is it. I want to see how it goes.”
The superstar is recovering from ankle surgery and will miss the final three games of this season.
“I’m hoping this ankle will give me a lot of relief next year and we’ll go from there,” Nowitzki said. “(Recovery) will be three or four weeks. It’s going to take some time unfortunately. It’s also the reason I went and got a head start on it. At my age, recovery takes a little longer.”
Nowitzki averaged 24.7 minutes, 12 points and 5.7 rebounds this season.