CHARLOTTE, N.C. _ Sometimes at this part of the season, it's difficult to keep a team's attention when the All-Star break is looming and the thoughts of multiple off days are dancing through players' heads.
That certainly is not the case for coach Brett Brown when it comes to his team. Despite the circus surrounding the team with trade rumors and secretive injuries, the 76ers won their third consecutive game with another balanced attack in downing the Charlotte Hornets, 105-99.
The Sixers started strong, forced Charlotte to miss eight of its first nine shots, let up a bit in the second, but found a groove in the second half and rode the hustling play of Dario Saric in improving to 21-34. The loss was the 10th in 11 games for the Hornets, who fell to 24-31.
Saric hustled his way to 18 points, fought for 11 rebounds, all while leading fastbreaks, running down loose balls and playing aggressive defense. He stayed on the floor for the whole fourth quarter.
"There is a confidence all over the place to shoot the ball, which, I think, is the path, the link to him really being unique in spacing the floor," Brown said. "But it's extended into putting the ball on the floor and making plays, rebounding and leading breaks and coming up with tough rebounds in traffic. You've noticed that I've ended games with him. I think he's growing into himself and playing with a great confidence all over the place. I feel over the last few weeks we've seen him blossom."
Robert Covington scored 17 points. T.J. McConnell had 14 and added seven assists. Nerlens Noel and Gerald Henderson scored 12 each, while Nik Stauskas added 11. Ersan Ilyasova picked up 10 rebounds in just over 20 minutes.
Like Saric, the team has blossomed, too, over the past three games, following a five-game losing streak. Once again, the ball and players moved well, which accounted for such balanced scoring. The Sixers also killed it on the boards, finishing with a 51-33 advantage. And while he finished with 29 points, Charlotte point guard Kemba Walker never took over the game as he is capable of doing.
"You just try to make his night as difficult as possible," McConnell said. "I just try to get in his way and be annoying and disruptive at the defensive end around him and make him work for everything. You know he's going to score, you're not going to shut down Kemba Walker. It's impossible. But you can contest all of his shots and make it tough."
McConnell did all of that on the night as Charlotte stayed mired in a terrible slump.
"Steve (Clifford) is a friend of mine and a hell of a coach," Brown said of Charlotte's coach. "I think the work that we saw him do with that team last year confirms that, and I feel like with this year's team, it confirms the NBA is a league, at times, of peaks and valleys. You know, we just left a team (Miami) that won 13 games in a row, and now we're coming in against a legitimate playoff team that just in a down period of an NBA season, which is really quite common pre-All-Star break if you really sort of study it. I think they're still good. They still play defense, they're well coached and they're disciplined. I think they've missed some more offensive opportunities more than defensive opportunities, and they've played against good teams. I don't think there's much to read into it."
The Sixers will play Wednesday in Boston, their last game for nine days. Apparently, though, they aren't even thinking about that just yet.
