Instant observations: Sixers submit gutless effort vs. Hornets

Tyrese Maxey’s Sixers never showed up for the game in a 130-93 loss to the Charlotte Hornets, taking a giant, steaming dump on the floor as a group. The 76ers now have to fly home and go at it again tomorrow against the Milwaukee Bucks.

Here’s what I saw.

Nobody showed up for this game

There’s not enough lipstick in the world to make this performance look any less piggish. The Sixers must have heard that everyone back home was having a snow day and figured they would put in the effort and focus of a remote worker putting in a shift through Microsoft Teams (no free promo).

Unfortunately, the ringleader of that effort was Tyrese Maxey, who has rarely turned in a game like this in his career, much less during this season. From the very start of the game, he did not seem to be engaged with what was happening on the floor. There were blown defensive rotations, lackadaisical retreats in transition, and perhaps more pertinently, some of the worst offensive possessions I have seen from him all year. We can be frank: Maxey tossed up some absolute garbage, praying for the officials (or a higher power) to bail him out as he lumbered toward the paint. Perhaps a call or two was missed, but that doesn’t explain the volume of midrange junk with a hand in his face with plenty of time left on the shot clock.

For a guy who has preached the value of showing up every day and maintaining a high competitive level, it was an especially brutal performance, even if we can understand why it is so hard to routinely play 40+ minutes at a high level. Dead legs and jumpers that are hitting front rim? That’s something I can excuse (to some extent) and write off as a problem that will fade after the All-Star break. But there was a lot more to it than that, and as the face of the franchise, I expect much better from him.

(By the way, there are a fair number of people in the fanbase who still want to have their cake and eat it too with Maxey, essentially using Embiid and George as human shields when he errs, while giving him the bulk of the credit if the team succeeds. It’s nonsense! Losing games with an undermanned roster is one thing, but he is a max contract player getting put in All-NBA conversations. If you don’t have enough to go, don’t suit up. A lot of people would sympathize with you being worn down. But this was a steaming pile of crap from a player who is better than this on every level.)

On the other hand, the Sixers’ offensive process was generally terrible, and the ecosystem flat out sucked for most of Monday afternoon. I want to blame the coach for some of that, because he is choosing to put lineups with multiple non-shooters on the floor together. Opting to roll with Drummond/Barlow and Bona/Walker is already conceding the spacing battle, allowing the opponent to drop players toward the paint or shade coverage toward your ballhandlers, living in no fear of weakside threes. But Nurse also made attempts to rectify that problem by playing three-guard looks that included Jared McCain, he of the season-long slump. When those don’t work, what do you have left? Maxey-Edgecombe-Oubre-Watford with a nominal center? Even that is a group with 2.5 shooters at best.

Speaking of McCain, his first shift almost completely broke my spirit for this season, perhaps because he looks like his spirit is broken when he plays meaningful minutes. On his first scoring opportunity of the game, he nearly airballed a three from an open corner position, and then clanged a second one short after an offensive rebound and reset. A layup in transition was a brief glimmer of hope, only for McCain to get pasted by a screen and waltzed past by LaMelo Ball for an easy two on the other end. The cruelty of the game was that McCain only got a jumper to drop moments after the Sixers were whistled for a moving screen, his shoulders dropping in sadness when he realized a make had been wiped out. He was subbed out moments later.

With McCain approaching or perhaps already in write-off territory for this season, what do you do for bench shooting except pray that Quentin Grimes gets going? It’s an unenviable position to be in for Nurse, and a problem they probably have to address at the deadline unless the plan is just praying McCain wakes up one day and remembers how to hoop. At present, their ability to miss open three after open three isn’t just a scoring problem, but a two-way issue, as it leads to long rebounds, run outs, and easy buckets for opponents. Charlotte is an up-tempo outfit that punished their disinterested transition defense on Monday, showing off a little bit with some lobs and above-the-rim plays on the break.

That’s not to excuse their crimes against basketball on defense as nothing more than a function of the offense. Nurse is never going to go away from it, but their insistence on playing an aggressive help scheme leads to far too many extended scoring runs for opponents. They believe the juice is worth the squeeze to create turnovers, but they give up far too many open threes trying to gamble for steals. There is a middle ground to be found, but it’s not clear they’re interested in finding it.

It was the sort of game where the Hornets pushed the lead to 15, and you asked aloud whether anyone would step to the forefront and change the game with a jolt of energy. VJ Edgecombe looked like a candidate for a brief flash in the second quarter, hitting a contested three before a transition leak-out that turned into a two-hand slam. That was the basketball equivalent of pissing into the wind, unfortunately. Edgecombe would finish 2/11 and make a fair amount of defensive mistakes of his own, leaving the starting backcourt with a sparkling 5/23 outing from the field and matching -36 marks in the plus/minus department. Not going to win many games when that happens.

That’s about 1000 words to more creatively say that the Sixers sucked against Charlotte. They played like a team that was happy to use the Embiid and George absences as an excuse to lose, and they got the result that their effort deserved. Submit a stinker like this on Tuesday, and the Giannis-less Bucks will have Thanasis attempting dunk contest submissions in garbage time. Get it together, fellas.

Other notes

— McCain hit two threes in extended garbage time for a 4/8 shooting night from deep! Will that be what turns his season around? I will leave claims like that to the copers; I am not hopeful personally. Play him tomorrow, and let’s see what happens.

— An addendum to the previous section header: Kelly Oubre showed up today, so he is excluded from the above screed.

— Quentin Grimes playing like complete trash for the meaningful portion of the game and then running the stats up in garbage time was less amusing to watch than it was during the tank run last season. His inability to play competent basketball has had an outsized impact on their bench in recent weeks and is a major factor in their inconsistent play since 2026 started.