Wiz of Awes
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Washington Wizards Three Takeaways: Wizards Top Sixers, Win 11th Straight At Home

By Ben Mehic

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Washington Wizards continued their winning streak at home, beating the Philadelphia 76ers in dominant fashion on Saturday night.

NBA players are naturally competitive, but it’s tough to get up for bad opponents.

The Philadelphia 76ers entered Saturday night’s game against the Washington Wizards having won three straight, but their reputation as a lottery-bound team has made it difficult to shake the lack of enthusiasm that follows them.

Washington started the game slow, allowing the Sixers to gain a double-digit lead rather quickly.

Ersan Ilyasova, who’s surprisingly one of the league’s best 3-point shooters, swung the momentum to Philly’s side. The Wizards looked disinterested defensively and the Sixers got uncontested layups at the rim.

As the game progressed, the Wizards became more in-tune on defense, getting consecutive stops that led to points on the other end. The Sixers inevitably began to struggle to score – they were missing Joel Embiid – and John Wall caught fire in the third quarter.

Quickly in the second half, the Wizards’ lead ballooned.

Their start wasn’t ideal, but the Wizards managed to close out the game strongly, 109-93, winning their 11th straight game inside the Verizon Center.

Wall erupts in the third quarter

John Wall is averaging over 20 points per game this season, the most he’s averaged since entering the NBA in 2010, but he’s not necessarily a “scorer.”

Wall is certainly capable of scoring 30+ on any given night, but lacks the innate ability – something that the likes of Kevin Durant and Stephen Curry have, for instance.

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In the third quarter, with his pinky finger wrapped up, Wall showed rare flashes of that sort of scoring after hitting a pull-up 3-point shot, which he followed up with another 3-point shot on the next possession.

His shooting caused Brett Brown to call a timeout and it was all downhill from there for the Sixers.

Wall finished the game with 25 points.

He scored 11 in the third quarter.

New faces fail to take advantage of opportunity

Tomas Satoransky and Andrew Nicholson were supposed to play relatively large roles in their first seasons in Washington, but both players have been out of Scott Brooks‘ rotation, mainly because neither did enough to earn minutes early in the season.

Both were given a chance to play against the Sixers, but once again, neither did enough to stand out.

When Marcin Gortat got into foul trouble, Brooks called upon Nicholson.

Nicholson made just two of his five shots – all of which he rushed. It’s almost as if he’s trying to impress the coaching staff rather than allow the offense to come to him.

Satoransky was largely invisible. He missed all three of his field goal tries in 21 minutes of action.

Surprisingly, Brooks has been more reliant on the younger players recently. Sheldon McClellan got garbage minutes at the end of the game and Marcus Thornton didn’t play.

Washington still lacks rim protection

Ian Mahinmi has only played 14 minutes this season due to injury and the Washington Wizards sorely miss his rim protection.

Jahlil Okafor started in place of Embiid on Saturday and scored 26 points. It was his first 20-point game of the season.

Washington allowed Okafor to dominate down low without much resistance. Even worse, the Wizards gave up a number of uncontested baskets at the rim from simple dump-off passes.

This problem, unfortunately, will remain a constant for the Wizards unless they can upgrade their personnel.

Next: Wizards Need To Figure Out Whether They Can Contend or Not

The Wizards are now sixth in the East. They’ll take on the Portland Trail Blazers on Monday night.

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