How Decisions Off the Court Influenced the Sixers' Biggest Win of the Season

The Charlotte Hornets committed a cardinal sin.

After pushing their lead to 15 points with six minutes and 40 seconds to play in the third quarter, they allowed five points in 48 seconds.

Surrendering a 3 to Paul George is game flow. Allowing VJ Edgecombe to piggyback that with a layup is a small run. 30 seconds of game time later, Edgecombe canned a corner 3 in transition.

The 15-point buffer was chewed down to seven just like that.

The youthful Hornets are very good. But they are youthful.

The Sixers have not enjoyed the in-season rebound the Hornets have. But they are veteran.

A Brandon Miller transition dunk off a lob from LaMelo Ball with seven minutes and 39 seconds remaining in the third quarter pushed Charlotte's lead to its zenith.

The Hornets made one shot the remainder of the quarter, a Coby White layup that expanded Charlotte's lead to six points with a minute to play in the third.

The Hornets, still wet behind the ears, gave the Sixers an inch. They took a foot.

There was blood in the water with 12 minutes to play.

Two head coaches standing on opposite ends of the same sideline were about to decide the game.

They just didn't know it.

Adem Bona played a few ticks fewer than six minutes in the first half. That was his only action of the night.

The Hornets' size gave the Sixers' fits all game long. So Nick Nurse went in a different direction to start the fourth quarter, Joel Embiid playing 12 straight minutes after halftime.

Andre Drummond spelled Embiid to start the fourth quarter. He played the first six minutes and 20 seconds of the quarter.

They were the biggest minutes of the game.

No, it was not a gaudy stint of production for Drummond. He amassed just two rebounds and a blocked shot.

He flipped the game with his size.

On the other side, Charles Lee played Moussa Diabaté and Ryan Kalkbrenner a total of six minutes and 47 seconds in the fourth quarter.

Diabaté pulled down 11 rebounds in nearly 25 minutes of action. Kalkbrenner pulled down just one in 17-and-a-half minutes.

Those two bigs are some of the most prolific offensive rebounders in the NBA. The game sat firmly in the Hornets' hands largely because those guys set the tone on the offensive glass.

Charlotte did not need a first-shot offense for much of this game. They were having their way because they rebounded 38.1% of their own missed shots, per Cleaning The Glass.

Diabaté spear-headed that effort with seven offensive rebounds alone.

And yet, Lee went away from Charlotte's traditional size in the fourth quarter.

He opted to go small with Grant Williams, who accumulated five offensive rebounds of his own, and Miles Bridges acting as bigs for much of the quarter.

The result?

A fourth quarter in which the Sixers won the glass by six.

The Hornets won the glass by 12, overall. They created 21 second-chance plays.

Charlotte didn't record a single offensive rebound in the fourth quarter.

It was not difficult to understand Nurse's logic for going with Drummond, even if you disagreed with the adjustment. And to the credit of both the player and the coach, Drummond was basically heroic in his minutes.

But there was no sound logic for Lee going away from his size.

The Sixers had no business winning the game, but they found themselves with the basketball, trailing by a point with one minute and six seconds remaining in regulation.

George had missed his two prior attempts from beyond the arc in the quarter. He was not going away empty-handed.

Paul George back-screens for Oubre, creating a need to communicate between Ball and Bridges. They mess it up and Bridges never gets over Embiid's corner pin-down for George. Open 3. pic.twitter.com/1wpT0uvupy
— Austin Krell’s Film Room (@AKFilmRoom) March 29, 2026

The Sixers never looked back.

The possession game did not balance out the rebounding woes. Both teams committed nine turnovers. Even with Eric Collins deeming Embiid a "free throw merchant" on the broadcast, the Hornets attempted three more foul shots than the Sixers did.

Charlotte took 14 more shots in the game.

But they shot 5-for-22 in the fourth quarter. The Sixers shot 8-for-20.

The Hornets have been arguably the second best team in the NBA since the calendar turned to 2026, both in record and net rating. They are legitimately very good, a poor start to the season anchoring them to the Play-In tournament.

It was a matchup that offered few built-in advantages to either side. The Hornets had one day of rest coming in. The Sixers had two. Charlotte was missing Tidjane Salaun, who has been a fringe rotation player this season. Philadelphia was fully healthy.

The full-health Sixers went into the Hornets' nest and exited without so much as a sting for their best victory of the season.

VJ Edgecombe is changing the Sixers' spacing

In Embiid and George's return on Wednesday, there was no choice but to give Edgecombe the ball. He and Quentin Grimes were the only core rotation guards available.

But Maxey was back on Saturday, a return slightly ahead of schedule from what was expected at the time of his pinky injury.

Yet, the Sixers trusted Edgecombe to initiate the offense for long stretches of this game, even with Maxey on the floor.

That Edgecombe knows to feed the beast can't hurt his case.

Embiid/Edgecombe pick-and-roll, Edgecombe pitches back for Embiid 3. pic.twitter.com/6mIW8KJQAU
— Austin Krell’s Film Room (@AKFilmRoom) March 29, 2026

Not only does it buy Maxey some rest within the game, but it allows him to serve as an off-ball threat.

In the two-man game between Embiid and Edgecombe, Maxey is a magnet keeping uninvolved defenders in home position. If they pinch on Embiid, the franchise-leader in 3-point makes is open:

Edgecombe feeds Embiid in high post, help comes and Embiid finds Maxey spacing to weak-side corner. pic.twitter.com/062pBvNpvL
— Austin Krell’s Film Room (@AKFilmRoom) March 29, 2026

Edgecombe didn't get the volume to keep pace with Embiid, Maxey and George. But he had his moments within the offense in a high-stakes game.

It may only be the end of March, but this game had the feel of a playoff battle.

The physicality was endless. Charlotte's crowd dramatized each and every bit of contact levied upon their team. The shotmaking and sheer will to make plays was incredible.

And in the most important regular-season game in years, Nurse showed his cards a bit. He mixed and matched the backup center position depending on how the game went.

Justin Edwards and Cam Payne were on the very fringes of the rotation. Trendon Watford and Jabari Walker did not play.

There is a storyline that looms, though.

Dominick Barlow started and played about 15-and-a-half minutes. He recorded two rebounds. Barlow's rebounding rates are not inspiring for a big.

When the game came down to crunch time, Kelly Oubre was in—not Barlow.

Yet, there is a method to the madness. Lineups with Barlow and Embiid are outscoring the opposition by 8.4 points per 100 possessions in 1,104 possessions this season, per Cleaning The Glass.

The duo works well enough. Barlow is cerebral, can defend across multiple positions and does not require any usage on offense.

But if you're not getting a rebounding boost out of a guy that size and he doesn't come with a polished set of ancillary skills, is he really contributing in the postseason?