Halfway through the Season, Should the Sixers Still Have Championship Expectations?
Should Sixers fans still have championship expectations? Championship hopes?
Emotions ran high at the Wells Fargo Center last Thursday as the 76ers won their second straight (home) game against a high-charged, well-coached Celtics team without their star center. Two consecutive wins against playoff-caliber teams seemed to be the medicine the doctor ordered and would hopefully re-energize this team.
As malaise sets in, and Philadelphia sports junkies look ahead to opening day and the NFL draft, let’s see if there are still brighter days ahead for this underperforming team using the past five NBA Finals Champions as benchmarks.
The 2014 Finals champion San Antonio Spurs finished with a regular-season record of 62-20 and endured only one three-game losing skid. That was to start the second half of the season after tallying 32 wins during the first portion of the season.
Golden State etched their names in the NBA history books the following season with a 67-15 regular-season campaign and an NBA finals victory against LeBron James’ resurgent Cleveland Cavaliers. During the season, Steve Kerr’s Warriors successfully evaded three-game losing streaks and finished the first half of the season with a stellar 35-6 record.
LeBron finally brought the city of Cleveland a championship the following June when his Cavaliers knocked off the defending NBA champions and finished the regular-season record of 57-25. Unlike the previous two examples, the 2015-2016 Cavs finished the first half of their season sitting at 30-11 – the best record in the Eastern Conference – and fired their coach midseason, while somehow managing to avoid losing more than three consecutive games.
Next up is (again) the Golden State Warriors, who convincingly won the NBA Finals and finished the regular season with a 67-15 record. The Kevin Durant-led Warriors concluded the first part of the season with a 35-6 record and followed a 3-game losing streak with 14 consecutive wins.
Finally, we all know who brought home the NBA crown last June. ‘Fun guy‘ and his mates finished the season with a 58-24 record, while only dropping three games in a row once and carrying 29 wins into the halfway point.
Importantly, these teams also led their conferences or comfortably held the two seed throughout the regular season.
Now that we have base rates, are championship expectations – or even hopes – reasonable to have at this point in the season?
Well, the Sixers are currently on pace to win 50 games, which is one less than a season ago and two less than the 2017-2018 season. They are also hovering (I use this term loosely) around the 29 or 30+ wins at the halfway point, which past champions show us might be the necessary blueprint to carry some momentum into the final (also the most grueling) stretch of the season and into the postseason.
The locker room seems to be a major factor in breaking down faster than Terrell Owens’ relationship with Donovan. Ben Simmons refuses to shoot 3s and Brett Brown claims he failed to help him develop into a next-level star. The point guard also disappears in the second half of crucial games and their other cornerstone of the franchise, Joel Embiid, isn’t having fun this year. At all.
Oh, and while we’re on the topic of Joel Embiid, he’s out indefinitely after undergoing surgery to repair ligament damage following a gruesome hand injury against the Thunder. Brett Brown also seems to be marginalizing Al Horford, who said he is limited in how much offensive horsepower he can provide.
To be fair, it is also worth pointing out this year’s NBA is drastically different than year’s past and, perhaps, the most competitive in a decade. The Heat and Celtics are (unexpectedly) right around the 29, 30+ win a sweet spot at the midway point, but lagging far behind the Bucks who managed to win 35 of their first 41 games of the 2019-2020 season.
So, the 76ers are underperforming, but the rest of the NBA is also over-performing. Things do need to change, however, or else they won’t reach the second round of the playoffs.
Championship expectations probably do need to be tamed (and mostly are), but there still is hope. These next 41 games will give fans a better outlook for the immediate and long-term direction of this franchise.
Featured Image: @ESPNNBA *Exact records and statistics may have changed from the time of publishing of this article.
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