Sixers snag huge win vs. Heat behind monster Tyrese Maxey game

Tyrese Maxey had one of the best games of his career with a 37-9-11 masterpiece, pushing the Sixers to a critical 109-105 win over the Heat.

Here’s what I saw.

The Good

— In a season that has featured a ton of big-time Tyrese Maxey performances, his first half against Miami ranks at or near the top of the list. Coming off of a brief injury layoff, he threw an absolute haymaker at the Heat in the opening minutes, and when they responded with a huge run in the second quarter, it was No. 0 who came back with another straight right, stopping the opponent in their tracks.

The longer Maxey has been in the league, the more teams have figured out how to stop his speed from harming them, but the Heat had no such luck on Thursday. Looking a bit refreshed, Maxey’s ability to mix speeds and accelerate past defenders on their heels killed Erik Spoelstra’s crew. Embiid’s presence certainly helped — you could see a few Heat players doing the math in their heads, trying to figure out who to sell out against — but their star guard got it done even in solo minutes, cooking a bunch of would-be stoppers.

Speed wasn’t just a killer for Maxey as a scorer. In a game that was played at a frenetic pace, Maxey always seemed to be in complete control of himself and where the game was tilting on any given possession, as he absorbed pressure and moved the ball appropriately once Miami tried to sell out to stop him. He is one of very few players in the league who can consistently create for others, score 25+ points, and keep the turnover count low at the same time. New teammate and longtime point guard Kyle Lowry must look at him with great pride.

Maxey just had everything working in this one. Stepback jumpers from midrange, sidestep threes, and some of the most beautiful finishing this side of Kyrie Irving. Miami does an excellent job of shrinking the floor and showing you arms at the rim, and Maxey neutralized a lot of decent defense, creating separation with his shoulder before making some tough shots off of the glass.

As the big man faded down the stretch, it was Maxey who carried Philadelphia to the finish line, hitting tough midrange shots to bring them close enough to steal this victory. Paired up with his older, starrier teammate, Maxey was the man.

— The first quarter of Sixers-Heat provided us with a level of basketball we have not seen in Philadelphia for months. Although we will start with Joel Embiid, rightfully so, this was far from a one-man show. The Sixers talked about this one as if it was a playoff game, and they came out like they meant it.

Having Embiid around has taken the pressure off of everybody wearing Sixers gear, and yes that includes you, the reader. Miami lost their ability to cheat against dribble handoffs, knowing that overplaying it could lead to a quick move from the big guy toward the rim. And after getting up to game speed against Oklahoma City on Tuesday night, Embiid showed what a difference just one game can make, playing decisively no matter what the Heat threw at him with the ball in his hands.

Bam Adebayo has actually had a decent amount of success against Embiid in his career, despite that looking like a rough matchup for the Kentucky product on paper. For 2.5 quarters, Embiid had him in hell — he was hitting turnaround jumpers, getting him to lunge past him at the free-throw line, and just raining threes on his head, punishing the smaller man for giving any semblance of space to let one go. That started to shift the deeper they got into this game, which shouldn’t come as a huge shock, but we at least got some flashes of vintage Embiid, which is enough for me two games into the comeback.

More importantly, I thought Embiid showed better physical confidence in himself in this game, even if he lacked the lungs to bully the Heat for four quarters. He mixed it up a bit more in traffic, hedged on more pick-and-rolls defensively, and had some awesome moments around the rim — including a play where he just ate Jimmy Butler up at the rim. It is abundantly clear that he needs to get his wind back, but aside from that, things appear to be trending in the right direction.

— An absolute bozo game for Kelly Oubre. No idea what he was seeing out there 75 percent of the time. And then he scored seven of the most important points of the game, so this really is the season of Kelly.

The Bad

— If Joel Embiid’s conditioning (read: lack thereof) showed up anywhere in this game, it was on the glass, where the Sixers got pushed around quite a bit on both ends. Embiid had next to no lift and little interest in chasing loose balls, and the Heat were all too happy to punish them for it.

Related to this line of thought — Miami ran up the margins in transition, making up for a great halfcourt game for Philadelphia.

— “Make or miss league” can be overused to explain away more complicated problems, but it is the exact phenomenon we saw in the opening seven minutes of the second quarter of this game. The Miami Heat have stifled many teams, the Sixers included, with tough zone defense over the years. They did no such thing on Thursday night and were super fortunate that Philly’s role players were absolutely ice cold.

For once, the Sixers’ execution against Miami’s infamous zone was excellent. Joel Embiid felt pressure, and found the open target immediately, either leading to an immediate open three or a series of swing passes to create one. When someone needed to hit a skip pass to punish some overzealous scrambling, they did it. They got the players who you’d want to get the ball in the middle of the zone (mostly Embiid and Nic Batum). The only problem was, well, hitting shots. Philadelphia could not hit water from a boat, and the Heat came roaring back from a big deficit to take a lead midway through the quarter.

A real shame, because I will have to hear about Miami’s terrifying zone defense from a lot of you guys for the rest of the season now. They got lucky playing coward ball and I stand by that.

The Ugly

— What in god’s name were the Sixers doing in the final minutes of the first and second quarters? Cam Payne had maybe the worst 30 seconds of his season to end the first quarter, completely melting down against full-court pressure from Miami to gift them consecutive buckets. They were ever-so-slightly better in the second, but in a clear “hold for the last shot” situation, Embiid tried to thread a difficult pass through traffic and sent the Heat running the other way for a buzzer-beating three by Terry Rozier.

You could credibly argue they should have been up 20+ points at halftime. Instead, they held an eight-point lead heading into the intermission. The quarters are 12 minutes long, not 11, my dudes.

Unfortunately, Philadelphia did not learn their lesson after halftime. Though the lead was a bit smaller this time after a back-and-forth third, the Sixers allowed Jimmy Butler to score five straight points to end the period, and Miami carried a lead into the fourth.

I would direct a decent amount of my ire at Nick Nurse, who did not figure out what the problem was at halftime. One of Tyrese Maxey and Kyle Lowry should be on the floor at all times, so long as they’re both healthy and not being overtaxed with minutes. The Cam Payne/Buddy Hield combination in the backcourt was as bad as it gets on Thursday, and they were at the center of some of Philly’s colossal screw-ups. This can’t happen in the playoffs (assuming they get there, of course).

— While we are on the subject of Hield, this version of Hield is genuinely unplayable in the playoffs. He has been given the benefit of the doubt with Embiid on the mend, but he missed at least three wide-open threes that would qualify as practice shots for much worse shooters than Hield.

No more excuses. Go get it done, or you’re not going to play.