Game 29: Spurs almost make 15-point comeback, but fall to Sixers in crunch time

(1) Another Wemby block party (2) Stephon Castle off the bench (3) Julian Champagnie in the 4th

Monday in Philly was quite a game for the San Antonio Spurs and 76ers. In the second quarter, the Sixers’ crowd got energized after Andre Drummond was ejected, and then able to return to the game after his ejection was rescinded. A few minutes later, Victor Wembanyama drew a charge on a Joel Embiid drive. Embiid was upset with the call and he directed his anger toward the referee. Embiid was ejected from the game after consecutive technical fouls.

It was a close, defensive game for both teams in the first half, with the Sixers taking just a 3-point lead into halftime. In the third, Philly got some separation from the Spurs, by building a 15-point lead. The Spurs pushed back and were only down 9 heading into the fourth.

In the fourth, the Spurs were able to take a slim 1-point lead with 3 minutes left after Wemby made his 6th three in the game. Tyrese Maxey (32 points) would put two key possessions together for Philly though. After a Chris Paul mid-ranger over Paul George, Maxey finished with a dunk to put the Sixers ahead by 1. On the following Spurs possession, Julian Champagnie turned the ball over with a bad entry pass and with 30.5 seconds left, Maxey drilled a contested pull-up three over Jeremy Sochan to give the Sixers a 4-point lead.

Philly would hold on to defeat the Spurs by 5 points, 111-106.

“I thought their physicality got to us throughout the game, especially early on,” said Spurs Acting Head Coach Mitch Johnson after the game. “I thought they pushed off spots. We didn’t have strong catches. They kept us out of sync, played a lot of late clock, just some of those things. We just could not really find a rhythm offensively I thought. Give them credit, it was a big part of what they did to us, not just us missing shots, and then when we did miss shots, we had 3 offensive rebounds.”

“We didn’t hold to our standards offensively,” said Wemby of the Spurs’ loss after the game.

“I think that game goes differently if those last two turnovers don’t happen,” said Champagnie of his turnovers toward the end of the game. “That’s just how I’m going to feel about it.”

With the loss, the Spurs fall to 15-14 overall and back to 10th in the Western Conference play-in picture as of 8:55 PM MT. The Spurs are also now 4-7 on the road, and 2-2 against teams from the East.

The Spurs fell to 4-11 when trailing by 15 points in a game this season. The crunch time loss brought the Spurs’ crunch time record to 8-4, still Top-5 in crunch time winning percentage, now moving to 3rd.

Here are the three items that will covered in this postgame edition:

• (1) Another Wemby block party

• (2) Stephon Castle off the bench

• (3) Julian Champagnie in the fourth quarter

I was going to write a What went wrong? item as well, but after looking at the numbers overall for both teams, had a few possessions gone the Spurs’ way in crunch time, this could have instead been a postgame report on a win.

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(1) Another Wemby block party

After Wemby recorded 10 blocks against the Portland Trail Blazers Saturday, he followed that game up with 8 blocks against the Sixers.

Let’s jump straight into those 8 blocks:

1. KJ Martin dunk attempt in transition during the 1Q

2. Andre Drummond layup attempt in the 1Q

3. Kyle Lowry pull-up jumper from mid-range in the 1Q

4. Caleb Martin floater at the end of the 1Q

5. Maxey layup attempt in the 2Q

6. Pinned a Maxey layup attempt in the 2Q

7. Kelly Oubre Jr. driving layup attempt in the 2Q

8. Paul George layup attempt in the 3Q

The Spurs as a team finished with 12 blocks, their second most in a game this season. Along with Wemby, Devin Vassell, Tre Jones, Champagnie, and Charles Bassey each record a block against the Sixers.

This season, Wemby has now had 5 games with 7 or more blocks. 3 of those games have taken place in the month of December.

When Champagnie was asked about other players continuing to challenge Wemby at the rim, he responded, “Good luck. Good luck going down there. I know that we want them to go down there and let him challenge shots, because he’s blocking a lot them.”

Victor also finished as the Spurs’ leading scorer with 26 points. Most of his scoring came off jump shots, with the Sixers limiting him to just 2 paint points and one trip to the free throw line. Regarding his one paint make, it was a 1-handed alley-oop off a pass from Castle. While Victor has been dishing alley-oops, this was his first time completing an alley-oop since December 8 against the New Orleans Pelicans.

Wemby got two mid-rangers to go in during the game. One, a face-up over Drummond, then the second over fellow countryman Guerschon Yabusele.

Victor finished 6-of-13 from distance. His first triple came in the second quarter on a spot-up look. He got an inbound three to go down in the third, as well as a wide open look from the center of the arc. Off a Devin Vassell drive, he got a corner three to connect, though the official shot chart didn’t record it as a corner make, instead an arc make. His two triples came in the fourth and crunch time, but he also missed a tough fading corner three in crunch time.

Wemby finished with 4 assists and 5 turnovers. Some of his turnovers came off trying to drive into double teams, or on one, he tried to throw a no-look pass that got intercepted. With his 4 assists though, 3 of them were alley-oop passes. He connected with Keldon Johnson in the first half on an oop, and then in the third quarter, he looked like he was going to take two floaters, but instead, they were oops to Sochan.

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(2) Stephon Castle off the bench