Sixers second-quarter wilt let Heat off the hook

MIAMI - Doug Collins could not have asked for a better start. If his young 76ers were nervous or jittery on Saturday for Game 1 of their first-round playoff series against the star-studded Miami Heat, they did not show it, not even a little.

For the first 12 minutes of the game, it looked as if the Sixers, not the Heat, were the second-best team in the Eastern Conference, the one playing at home, the one supposed to win. They were faster. They forced the quick tempo they wanted. They made the extra pass to get an easier shot. And they played such dogged defense that at times it looked as if the Sixers had a man advantage.

And then it stopped, and the game turned, and it left you wondering about that team: Where did it go and could it ever sustain that level of play against a team like Miami across a 48-minute landscape?

"Yeah, I think we can sustain it," said Elton Brand, the voice of reason and experience on the team.

The Sixers are going to have to, or their 97-89 loss will repeat itself in Game 2 on Monday, and Game 3 on Thursday, and Game 4 next Sunday, and this series will be over just like so many prognosticators have predicted: with a Miami sweep.

After the ostentatious way this team was put together, complete with "The Decision" and that obnoxious, championship-like celebration after the team was assembled but before it had won a thing, nobody outside of the Heat faithful wants to see a sweep. Far from it.

So it really was remarkable how lights-out the Sixers were to start the game. It was hard to predict how a team with three starters making playoff debuts would react to the situation. Before the game, Collins acknowledged that it wouldn't be "normal" for the players not to be nervous, and he said he just wanted them "to have fun."

That message must have stuck, because the Sixers scored on nine of their first 10 possessions to take a 20-8 lead. All five starters scored in the first five minutes, an indication of just how balanced and unselfish the offense was.

And the Sixers were getting after it on defense. When the first quarter ended, LeBron James had three points, and Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade had two points apiece. While the Sixers shot 60.9 percent from the field, the Heat were just 31.8 percent and had gotten outrebounded, 14-8.

In the days leading up to the game, Miami coach Erik Spoelstra said that they tried to simulate the Sixers' speed in practice, but it was impossible. You can't prepare for it, he said, only adjust to it.

"That speed . . . it caught us by surprise and got us on our heels," Spoelstra said. "They were playing at a different speed than us."

To counteract the speed discrepancy, Spoelstra went to a zone defense in the second quarter. He packed his players in closer to the basket, and despite playing a less aggressive defense, the Heat became much more active. The Sixers started missing the shots they had been making in the first quarter, and then on the defensive end they were called for foul after foul, creating a tentativeness that also affected their overall speed.

The second-quarter numbers were as poor as the first quarter numbers were good: The Sixers shot 33.3 percent in the second quarter, allowed Miami to shoot 52.4 percent, were outrebounded by 17-5, committed nine fouls to Miami's three, and got outscored 35-18.

"It changed their rhythm," Spoelstra said of the Heat's zone.

The Sixers didn't completely buy that, but it was hard to disagree. Heading into the locker room, the Sixers trailed by five after holding a 14-point advantage midway through the first quarter.

"We've seen [zone] throughout the season, so it wasn't the zone, per se," Brand said. "It was actually they raised their intensity on the 50-50 balls. They got a lot of loose balls that led to three-point shots, led to dunks and layups that hurt us. It wasn't the zone as much as their intensity that gave them second-chance points on loose balls."

Although the Sixers trailed by as many as 16 points in the third quarter, they managed a spirited run in the fourth, the type of run that has defined this team all season. Trailing by 88-75 with 6 minutes, 40 seconds to play, the Sixers scored 10 unanswered to cut the deficit to three. But just like their play in the first half, they could not sustain it. A missed three, two missed free throws, and then a bad decision on a fastbreak and that was the ball game.

At this point in the team's development, it might be too much to ask that the players sustain top-notch intensity for four quarters. They simply are not deep enough. Right now, Evan Turner and Andres Nocioni are not capable of giving the team significant, productive playoff minutes. They played a combined 19 minutes and made one field goal in five attempts between them.

"If we can sustain how we played in the first quarter just somewhat, we can have a lead in the second half instead of being five down," Brand said.

"Honestly, I think our defense is good enough to slow them down," Jrue Holiday said. "We can definitely sustain it, get a lot of fastbreak buckets, and just stop them on defense."

The Sixers better hope so, or this series, and season, is going to be over quickly.