Sixers grades: Low marks across the board in shorthanded loss to Utah Jazz

The 76ers just completed their worst two-game stint of the season, falling 120-109 to the Utah Jazz Saturday night after getting walloped by the New York Knicks on Friday.

Unsurprisingly, the instant positional grades reflect the poor play from a night the Sixers shot 40.4% from the floor and 7-of-38 from three-point range. The only thing keeping them from being even lower is how massively shorthanded they were in the second of two games on back-to-back nights as starters Joel Embiid, Tobias Harris and De’Anthony Melton and reserves Robert Covington and Furkan Korkmaz all out due to injury or illness.

Tyrese Maxey and Patrick Beverley faced a tough task initiating and organizing around rag-tag lineups. Maxey also acknowledged following the game that the Jazz threw him a variety of “junk” defenses he had rarely seen in his basketball life, much less his NBA career.

Still, the potential All-Star struggled with his shot in a game that Embiid did not play. He went 9-of-24 from the floor — including missing eight of his 11 first-half attempts — and was 1-of-8 from three-point range.

Beverley was initially a nice spark off the bench, totaling 12 first-half points on 5-of-9 shooting (including a go-ahead three-pointer) and adding four assists and three rebounds during that span. But he also went ice cold after the break, missing all four shot attempts.

Maxey did say after the game, however, that they found a useful attacking strategy when he and Beverley shared the floor, a pairing that occurs even when the roster is at full strength. When Maxey set screens, he said, that allowed Beverley to attack downhill.

It’s unrealistic to expect Paul Reed and Mo Bamba to fully replace Embiid’s dominant production on both ends of the floor.

Reed finished with a season-high 16 points shooting 7-for-12 from the field — though was perhaps trying to create too much for himself with mid-range jumpers — and six rebounds. Bamba had six points on 3-for-9 shooting and struggled to finish inside, including on a sequence when Beverley boisterously demanded that Bamba set a screen before failing to convert upon receiving the ball.

Those two were also the last line of defense on a night the Sixers surrendered a disastrous 72 points in the paint and allowed the Jazz to make 76% of of their two-point shots.

Nick Nurse emphasized that the blame should not be placed solely on Reed and Bamba, noting the Sixers must be better at stopping the ball while the big men are in drop coverage and that schematic or personnel changes could be necessary. Still, the two centers did not provide enough resistance as rim protectors and must “figure it out,” in Nurse’s words, even if undersized.

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Kelly Oubre Jr. scored 24 points and was the only Sixers to have a positive plus-minus (plus-1). He was initially aggressive in getting to the basket, with six of his eight free-throw attempts coming in the first half.

He also hit a corner three-pointer that briefly gave the Sixers a one-point lead in the second quarter. But he missed his other five long-range attempts, which Nurse said was not good enough when his team was without so much offensive firepower.

Neither was the 0-for-5 three-point outing from Nico Batum, who was also the primary defender for Markkanen’s 33-point night (though Batum did collect four steals and two blocks). Marcus Morris Sr., who slid into the starting lineup in Harris’ absence, was 1-for-4 from deep through three quarters, before hitting two in the final period that was too little, too late. One of those misfires could have cut the Sixers’ deficit to five points late in the third quarter.

After some strong play in rotation minutes earlier this week, Jaden Springer was a team-worst minus-15. He was left wide open for three first-quarter three-pointers and missed them all. KJ Martin, meanwhile, earned some postgame praise for his nine points on his 23rd birthday. He flew in for a game-tying dunk off an offensive rebound late in the second, and his transition finish cut Utah’s lead to 82-77 late in the third.