As playoffs near, Brown demands better D
PHILADELPHIA » In the glow of the results, his emotions for the moment soothed, Brett Brown expressed deep satisfaction in recent and similar 76ers victories over the Knicks and Nets.
“It’s always hard to win in Madison Square Garden,” he said one night last week. “It was a very satisfying win.” And the next night, he said, “I thought we executed quite well offensively in the fourth period tonight.”
Satisfaction doesn’t last long in the NBA. For Brown, it couldn’t survive the weekend. So by Monday in Camden, there he was, addressing his players, concentrating not on what they’d recently done, but what they hadn’t: Defend.
“The message was that nothing matters unless we play defense,” Brown said. “It’s how we have set the tone of this program since the day I arrived. We wake up this morning and we are fifth by our metrics, defensively, in the NBA. We were as high as third. I don’t like what I am seeing as much after the All-Star break. I especially did not like what I saw the last two games.”
By some accounts, Brown’s point was that it was time for the Sixers to become playoffready, at least mentally. He had begun spreading that message recently, if more subtly. By Monday, he was firm: The defense that permitted 58 first-half points to Brooklyn and 68 the night before in New York was unlikely to yield postseason success.
“We need to be locked in,” said Ben Simmons, of his takeaway from the meeting. “We have to be committed to following the game plan and playing hard the whole game.”
The Sixers had 14 regularseason games to play as they prepared to entertain the Charlotte Hornets Monday. It’s possible that their recent defensive lulls are natural, given the drain of the season.
“I think we have been kind of mentally fatigued,” Simmons said. “We had two days off, which I think should help us. But I think for us we just
need to be locked in and hold each other accountable.”
That was a mentality that was missing in the twin victories over New York-area opponents.
“That’s how it looked,” Simmons said. “We didn’t get off to the start we wanted, obviously. So I’d say so.”
Though they didn’t need reminding that they’d started the last two games slowly at the defensive end, the Sixers welcomed Brown’s push.
“Even though we’ve pulled out a victory in our last two games, we don’t seem to be playing at the level we can be playing at,” T.J. McConnell said Monday, after warmups. “And I think there is a lot of room for improvement in our energy and our attention to detail. And that is what he kind of tried to zoom in on, to get us focused in this last
stretch here, heading into the playoffs.”
Of all the signals that the Sixers’ recent acceptance of losing is long gone, nothing made that more clear than the head coach not even being satisfied with the quality of victories.
“There was a lot of good to come out of it,” Brown
allowed. “We managed to find ways to execute and guard in the fourth period. But to arrive at that point, I think our defense has become watered-down. And it can’t. The sting to our defense, Philly-hard, Philly-edge, that stuff matters. And we can’t just click our heels and start that again.
“I want that mentality. I want that mindset. And I want a belief that nothing matters unless we guard.”
If the Sixers defend as they have for most of the season, they can advance in the playoffs. That’s a possibility that Brown had made rarely, if at all … until Monday.
“If we do that, we can recalibrate a different goal,” he said. “We come in and we say, ‘We want to make the playoffs.’ Now, seemingly, we are pretty close to doing that. Now we all get greedy and say, ‘Let’s get a home court.’ And I’m the captain of that new club. And it can only happen if we guard. And that’s the message to our team.”