That’s the type of win that gets a young team into the postseason.

You don’t play your best, but you out-talent an inferior squad on your home court with “quiet” contributions from your superstar pair, who really stepped up when it mattered.

Ben Simmons and Joel Embiid combined for 15 points, 3 assists, and 4 rebounds in the game’s final five minutes. With 40 points total on the night, they put up 37.5% of their offensive production in that crucial time span, turning a seven point lead into a 10 point win. No need for nail-biting half court possessions down the stretch.

It was a strange game overall, however, with the Sixers jumping out to a 17-6 lead before being outscored 68-59 in the second and third quarters. The shots started falling again in the fourth quarter and the defense held Atlanta to just 16 points in the final 12 minutes of play. The Hawks couldn’t throw the ball in the ocean.

So the Sixers are a .500 team. I didn’t have them at 4-4 going into Friday night, but they’ll be favored to beat Indiana at home and head into the five-game road trip with a winning record for the first time since the fall of 2014.

As Cee Lo Green once said, “ain’t that some shit?”

1) Beautiful ball movement

There were two moments in this game where the crowd audibly gasped at the Spurs-like ball movement shown by the Sixers.

The first was this swing-pass sequence, where they moved the ball wonderfully around the perimeter but didn’t pull the trigger, instead trying to force one more pass down low:

Robert Covington probably had the best look there but passed it up.

On the second sequence, he decided to have a go instead, knocking down one of his six (!) three-pointers on the evening:

Covington finished with 22/3/3 and a pair of steals in 34 minutes. He’s a streaky shooter, but those shots look smooth when they’re falling.

2) Hack-a-Rookie of the Year

This is what Ben Simmons has done in his first eight games as a pro:

• 18-10-5
• 11-11-5
• 18-10-8
• 21-12-10
• 14-7-9
• 23-7-8
• 24-7-9
• 19-13-9

Uhhh…. yea…. that’s pretty good.

He leads all rookies in double-doubles, points per game, assists per game, and assist/turnover ratio. He’s second in rebounding.

You saw him again hit that elbow jumper in the first quarter. The mechanics will continue to improve, but the confidence he shows in trying that shot is most important. I think he also tried a little 10-foot fadeaway from the baseline that rolled off the rim. He was 7-12 inside the paint last night and 1-3 outside of it.

In the third quarter, Isaiah Taylor fouled Simmons about 10 feet in the backcourt, which brought out some hack-a-Shaq references on social media. Hack-a-Simmons?

Ben hit that ensuing first foul shot with no issue, then clanked the second off the front of the rim. He finished 3-6 from the stripe and is now shooting .553 from the line this season.

I think that’s his biggest weakness, more so than the mid-range game, since his ability to get to the hoop is intrinsically linked to the frequency of his foul-line visits. I’m surprised he’s not drawing more fouls.

Also, I don’t know why, but I put audio of Chris Farley’s “Rock the Vote” speech from Black Sheep over top of Ben’s monster dunk:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZYF2FdibWE

3) Spaced Out

Coming off a back injury, JJ Redick didn’t shoot the ball well last night, finishing with 8 points on 3-11 shooting and going 1-6 from downtown.

But Redick played 32 minutes and stayed in the game because of the “attention he creates,” according to Brett Brown:

“Do you go with Dario? Do you go with T.J.? Or do you go with Jerryd Bayless? Tonight we actually considered JJ, because he was struggling a little bit, he had only just come back, but you’re reminded that, no matter if he’s making shots or he isn’t, the attention he receives is prominent. You see it. It creates space. It turns it almost into a 4 on 4 game. I think we had him playing with Joel for maybe 5 or 6 possessions in a row. Whether he’s making shots or not he creates attention.”

I think that second clip I showed you above is a good example of what Brett is talking about, where T.J. McConnell finds Redick in the corner, who then picks out Embiid at the top of the arc for the swing pass to Covington. Defenses still have to respect that Redick corner opportunity, which pulls them out of position:

4) I know you like it extra sloppy!

I’m not talking about that lunch scene in Billy Madison, I’m talking about the Sixers’ 2nd and 3rd quarter defense.

This series of three plays right before halftime was particularly egregious:

https://youtu.be/LD98lov4EIc?t=5m13s

Dennis Schröder, whom Brown referred to as an “elusive, dynamic waterbug,” seemed to be getting to the rim at will. It was the best 12-minute performance featuring an umlaut since Mötley Crüe did “Shout at the Devil” in Camden a few years back.

Brown on the defense:

“We couldn’t guard them in the middle two periods, which hasn’t been the case. We’ve been playing really good defense. They’re a fast team. You know, like Dario, it’s a bad matchup for Dario. I thought, individually, the ‘me and you’ stuff, just guarding your man, we couldn’t in those middle two periods. We started out really well. We ended really well. But the middle two periods I thought we were poor. I thought as a team, closing out and executing down the stretch to be able to let our offense catch our defense, our defense was good in the fourth period. They had 16 points. I thought it was like a perfect storm for us where we were good on offense execution wise and good on defense, where it was a 25 or 26 to 16 period.”

Schröder was 6-8 in the second and third quarters, but went 7:43 without a bucket to start the 4th quarter.

They got it done when it mattered, but that late second quarter slump is starting to become a problem.