Tyrese Maxey dominates Lakers to earn third straight win for Sixers

Tyrese Maxey’s 43 points pushed the Sixers to a comfortable win over the L.A. Lakers, landing Philly a 118-104 victory with Joel Embiid and Paul George in street clothes.

Here’s what I saw.

The Good

— If the Sixers got this version of Tyrese Maxey to open the year, we might be looking at a very different season for Philadelphia. He can’t control the injuries, the nonsense, and the uncertainty hanging over this team, and he certainly isn’t solely responsible for the hole they are in record-wise. But if they have this guy on the floor, the Sixers are going to steal more games and begin climbing up the ladder with even moderate health luck for the rest of the roster.

After watching the Sixers stink it up to open the game, JJ Redick must have thought this was a good opportunity to get Bronny James onto the floor. Setting aside the merits of that decision for L.A., Maxey looked at the younger James and decided he was going to punish the Lakers for every second they gave him on the floor. Philadelphia ran some good offense in this game, but for that tail end of the second quarter, they played an extended version of Hunt the Bozo, forcing switches to get Bronny in front of Maxey as much as possible. At that point, Maxey started to get a head of steam going, driving to Bronny’s right over and over again to hit a gaggle of shots, layups, midrange fades, and spins off of James’ hip to get all the way to the rim.

Philadelphia caught a break going into the second quarter, with the Lakers announcing that Anthony Davis was questionable to return due to an abdominal muscle strain. The Lakers had no perimeter players with any prayer of slowing Maxey down, and with Davis’ rim protection and versatility gone, it was an open runway for Maxey to attack the rest of the game. The Sixers hung 48 points on L.A. in that second quarter — that feels borderline impossible with the supporting talent available — and Maxey was the engine, adding 12 of his 25 first-half points in those 12 minutes.

It was a good, not great night from deep, but he continues to have a level of confidence from three that makes it unsettling to guard him. If you drop when he’s going left for a stepback jumper, he will not hesitate to fire:

He looks like a player moving with greater purpose right now, operating on his terms rather than those being dictated by the opponent. Maxey has found a way to have it all, using the downhill speed to blow past defenders while still keeping them honest with pull-up shooting and playmaking from the other two levels. His head has been on a swivel while looking for his teammates, and though his assist numbers didn’t reflect that in this game, the swing-swing sequences are becoming more common by the game, often started by his slash-and-kick move to open a possession.

There have been many comments about Maxey getting a bad whistle this year, but he did what was required to put L.A. in free-throw jail on Tuesday — Maxey played physical, attack-first basketball, dipping his shoulder into defenders to initiate contact and ensure the officials would have an eye on what came next. He had nine free throws in the first half alone, and he continued punishing the Lakers after halftime.

It’s hard not to love how he’s playing when you combine that purposeful offense with his commitment on the other side of the ball. This has been his best and most vocal season on that end of the floor, and Maxey has not used the big offensive workload as an excuse to slack. He had a sequence in the second quarter where he hit a stepback three, ran down the floor for an early steal, and then picked up a foul on a drive to the basket, a beautiful stretch for anyone who admires two-way basketball.

There are tons of questions about what the Sixers should/are going to do at the trade deadline. Maxey seems to be signaling with his play that anything other than trying to improve the team would be a mistake. Point taken, young man.

— Guerschon Yabusele may be drawing dead against a player with the size, athleticism, and skill of Anthony Davis, but no one seems to have told him that’s the case. Big or small, skilled or not, Yabusele is going to play you the same way regardless. His combination of skill and determination has been a bright spot all season long, and that showed up again on Tuesday night.

Yabusele was the only Sixers player outside of Maxey to score a single point in the first quarter, and he got to double-digits through a beautiful combination of buckets. He beat a lazy closeout to get to the rim; cut into space to score an easy layup; hit Anthony Davis with fancy footwork and a post hook; and dunked all over Davis after ripping him for a steal on the other end.

He punctuated that quarter with a putback as the clock wound down, bringing the Sixers to an even 25-25 with L.A. While Yabusele didn’t do a ton of scoring the rest of the way, he was a hub for good offense, making at least a half-dozen great passes after catching the ball on the roll. He’s an intelligent player who constantly makes the Sixers better.

— Eric Gordon’s emergence as a semi-reliable option on offense has been a pretty huge deal, as he’s one of the few guys on the roster you’d expect to make an open catch-and-shoot jumper. And he’s making a ton of them lately, stretching defenses to their breaking point to contest 26, 27, and 28-foot threes from both sides of the floor.

The best example of this phenomenon came with LeBron matched up with Gordon in the first half, playing out to about the three-point line but not much past it. Gordon looked at the space between them and must have laughed at how much time he had to launch, and he punished LeBron for daring him to let it loose. Not to mention — he spent most of the game guarding LeBron!

— Justin Edwards’ stock is on the rise, with the Philly kid getting his first opportunity to start in a national TV game against the Lakers. All he had to do is, well, defend LeBron James and Anthony Davis and try to score against both of those future Hall of Famers. No big deal.

His sequence of the night came in the third, when Edwards hit a late clock, off-the-dribble three in LeBron’s face, and then proceeded to steal an attempted Lakers entry pass on the ensuing possession. Edwards is still taking a few too many fouls of exuberance and reach-ins on plays where he’d be better served to keep his hands back, but he has good positioning instincts and he competes. That’ll give him a chance.

— The fun thing about being a young big man is that there’s no real reason to show fear or “respect” for the elders. You’re 6’10” tall and athletic as hell, why should you show respect for any player rumbling down the lane? It’s your job to protect the rim, after all.

Even still, watching Adem Bona challenge LeBron James over, and over, and over again brought joy to my heart. I counted at least four James drives where Bona either stepped in as a rim protector or was guarding him outright on a switch, and he did an excellent job of stifling James around the basket. Bona blocked James clean two different times, turning away perhaps the greatest at-rim player the league has ever seen.

The only shame was that Bona was robbed of a potential career highlight — when he blocked James on a reverse attempt in the third quarter, he nearly threw down an insane lob from Tyrese Maxey on the other end, with an L.A. foul the only thing preventing him from a poster dunk. And if not for a Kyle Lowry foul, he would have gotten credit for blocking James a third time, on a drive early in the fourth quarter. Never lose that mentality — make drivers fear you, not the other way around.

— Another night, another box-score stuffing performance from Kelly Oubre. Without Embiid and George, it has been up to him to lead the rare Maxey-less lineups, and I think he has done an excellent job of handling that responsibility, especially in the opening minutes of fourth quarters.

— I nearly forgot Ricky Council IV, who was sent down for some G-League minutes on Sunday as he battles for a role in the rotation. One thing you can say about Council is that he has responded well to being challenged by the coaching staff, as he basically always comes back from an absence or an assignment like that with a positive mindset. And he had an excellent game in limited minutes on Tuesday, hitting three threes and adding some big-time plays at the rim to put the Lakers to bed.

He even drew a standing cheer from director M. Night Shyamalan on his reverse throwdown in transition deep in the fourth, a twist ending not even I would have predicted.

The Bad

— The Lakers.

The Ugly

— Lakers fans always have a big presence at Sixers games (and most games around the league) because they are a massive and passionate fanbase. I respect them for that. But it’s always fun when a crowd is split between the home and away fans, and the away fans end up sad and miserable because their team is getting punked left and right. Enjoyable for a neutral no matter where the game is being played.