Feels somewhat pointless to talk X’s and O’s with this lame duck Sixers team, but for the sake of content, here goes nothing.

There were a couple of postgame quotes talking about Boston getting tons of space between the rim and three point line on Wednesday night, right in that soft mid-range area. Taking a gander at the shot plot, it looks like the Celtics went 8-19 in that central area, between the slots, and didn’t try much of anything from the baseline at all.

Kemba Walker, who was 5-6 in midrange looks, said this after the game:

It’s “different” because it’s soft drop coverage, which the Sixers have played with Joel Embiid for a long time now. The philosophy isn’t anything hard to comprehend; it’s just a design to push ball handlers off the three point line and funnel them into Joel Embiid, which usually results in lower-efficiency mid-range looks. It also helps to prevent unwanted switches.

Problem is they weren’t contesting any of those mid-range looks at all, because with Embiid dropped in zone coverage and denying the roller, Boston was simply able to just pull up from 10-18 feet.

Said Joel on that:

“I know they want me to stay back on pick and rolls and protect the basket, but they’ve just been coming off making a lot of threes, so we gotta make adjustments. I’ve got to come up and we’ve got to scramble, but something has to change, it feels too easy. They’re just walking into those shots and it’s something we’ve got to fix.”

Visually, if we froze one of these plays at the precise moment where Boston finds the sweet spot, it would look something like this:

Boston runs a 1/5 pick and roll there, with the point guard and center. If Tobias Harris goes under the screen, it’s an open three point look for Kemba. So the Sixers like to go over and push the ball handler towards Embiid, but because he’s dropped so deep into zone coverage, Walker just pulls up for the shot from above the nail. Other teams would push Embiid higher and then send corner help via Shake Milton, but then you’re leaving Daniel Theis to kick out to a wide-open Marcus Smart.

Again, modern day basketball analytics will tell you that the shot above is less efficient than a three pointer or a look at the rim, but when the Sixers aren’t contesting these, or getting anywhere close to the shooter, then elite NBA players are going to knock them down to the point where the spreadsheet is rendered null and void. You could have a guy fire off 10-straight low efficiency corner 20-footers, but if nobody is even close to him, then he’s probably going to knock down a majority of the looks.

Other times they went over these screens and Boston still got off three point looks anyway (which is probably the bigger problem), like this shot from Jayson Tatum:

The issue here is that Enes Kanter sets that screen so high, that Tatum rounds the corner and winds up right on the three point line. This is the problem you have with guys like Damian Lillard, who have such incredible range that you go over screens and they’re pulling up from 25 feet anyway. Tatum has killed them a couple of times in this series on these side or high slot pick and rolls because he’s very decisive when shooting the ball. He doesn’t have Lillard’s range but can start the PNR from 3-5 feet above the three-point line.

Said Brett Brown on the pick and roll defense:

“I think you have to be smart about it. The obvious answer is to bring (Joel Embiid) out of the paint and up so there is some level of pressure. The punishment behind is real, (with) rollers, (defensive) scrambles, and so on. If you look at how many baskets they scored out of the pick and roll, as far as threes go, I think Tatum had three and Kemba had one. They’re dangerous in the mid-range game, and that is true. I feel like in the second half we did do that with some success but it wasn’t enough.”

You’re probably just going to have to play Embiid higher and live with the rolling and defensive rotations, because it’s better than having three guys stand around and watch two teammates get cooked.