SIXERS NEWS

The Sixers traveled to Toronto tonight for matchup with the Raptors as they looked to rack up their 6th straight win. They almost got it despite getting off to a horrible start on the night. In fact for the better part of the 1st 3 quarters it looked like they left their game back across the border. They just couldn't stop the Raptor's inside game so every time Toronto came down the court they were able to get the ball inside for an easy score. The Sixers just couldn't cover it, mostly because Elton Brand got into foul trouble and Samuel Dalembert only played about 20 minutes. It's hard to control things inside when you're best big men are on the bench. Anyway Toronto used their obvious size advantage to jump out to a 9 point lead at the half and a 23 point lead with 3 minutes to play in the 3rd quarter.

Then suddenly the slumbering Sixers awoke, rallying to within 15 heading into the 4th. From there it just kept getting tighter and tighter, from 15 down to 10, to 9, to 7 etc; Finally with 2 minutes to play in the 4th the Sixers completed the remarkable comeback knotting things up at 93. From there it was all Toronto though, with Jose Calderon completing a 4 point play, followed by a Lou Williams turnover, followed by a Andre Bargnani trey to all but sink the Sixers. Eventually after a painful 11-0 Toronto run to finish the night, the Sixers fell 104-93 . So in the end Toronto blew a 23 point lead and the Sixers let them get away with it. Really though it wasn't a particularly well played by either team. The Sixer's shot just 43% from the field while Toronto shot 47% from the field but hit one fewer trey than the Sixer's did. So the Sixer's should have at least been abe to keep it close, but they play so poorly early on that they fell way behind.

Andre Iguodala had 8 points on the night while Elton Brand posted just 11. Conversely, Lou Williams was the Sixer's leading scorer with 26 off the bench. It is usually not a good sign when your bench scores more than your starters. if nothing else this the Sixers best performance of the season while playing from behind. It's just unfortunate that they couldn't pull it out. Anyway with the loss the Sixers drop to 20-32 overal, but remain 10th in the Eastern conference, 5.5 games out of 8th.