Sixers win ugly preseason game over Boston Celtics
Sixers win first preseason game, thanks to a nice effort from their bench players.
Perhaps it was fitting tonight that the Sixers defeated the Boston Celtics for their first preseason win due to the play of their reserves. Because that's what Boston had on the court all night.
The Celtics did not play Kevin Garnett, Shaquille O'Neal, Paul Pierce, Rajon Rondo or Ray Allen as coach Doc Rivers chose to rest his star players. Doug Collins trotted out his starting lineup and was playing to win. His starters just didn't do a very good job of seeing that through. Had it not been for subs Lou Williams, Jason Kapano, Marreese Speights and Andres Nocioni, Collins might still be looking for his first win as Sixers coach.
The play of the first unit was not good, espeically considering they were matched up with Boston's second unit. To dig deeper, Elton Brand had no rebounds in 27 minutes. Evan Turner had five turnovers, Thad Young shot 3-for-12 and the first five of the Sixers got outrebounded by the Celtic starters by 27-18.
The starters seemed stagnent on offense, and underachieved enough early in the third quarter that Collins went to his bench. That's when the Sixers started to click and carried that through to the win.
Before the game, Collins said that starting center Spencer Hawes, who missed his third straight game with a strained back, could be out for two more weeks.
Questions abound.
Stay tuned.