Six Thoughts: Maxey, Edgecombe and Barlow Carry Sixers Past Mavericks

Tyrese Maxey scored 38 points, giving him 68 in a 24-hour span. VJ Edgecombe played a strong Robin to Maxey's Batman, and Dominick Barlow had his best game of the season. That was enough to earn the Sixers a victory over the Dallas Mavericks without Joel Embiid and Paul George.

Here are six thoughts on the game.

An early swing in the momentum

Philadelphia was stuck in mud for the first several minutes of the game, largely because of Dallas' defensive presence on the interior. The Sixers missed five layups in the opening stint of Anthony Davis and Cooper Flagg, allowing Dallas to slowly build a little bit of separation.

That all tumbled to the throwback hardwoods at Xfinity Mobile Arena when Daniel Gafford came in to relieve Davis. In a span of three minutes, the Sixers exploded past a one-point deficit to take a 12-point first-quarter lead. Much of the work came courtesy of VJ Edgecombe, who flat-out cooked Max Christie in a 25-second stretch late in the first quarter.

Christie fouled Edgecombe on a pair of jumpers, both of which Edgecombe converted. It was a seven-point turn in 24 seconds of game time.

Gafford wasn't the only turning point in that stretch, though. As soon as the Mavericks didn't have both Flagg and Davis on the court to cobble together the team's halfcourt offense, it was an epic disaster. Dallas' inability to make shots both crushed their own offense while also igniting Philadelphia's transition attack.

Perhaps the single biggest catalyst to Philadelphia taking control was Klay Thompson. Dallas needed his shotmaking, and he came up virtually empty in the first half. Meanwhile, the Mavericks could not keep up with the transition that his misses allowed.

Edgecombe's mid-range game

You should probably expect that this skillset will vacillate as the season goes on, if for no other reason than he's a rookie. But he's been on the money in the mid-range over the last couple games. These aren't even catch-and-shoot jumpers. He's taking the ball and patiently working his way to the spots he trusts the most.

This is all to say that Edgecombe's offensive ceiling is likely considerably higher if he can turn that into a shot that goes in with somewhere between 40-and-48-percent regularity.

Edgecombe doesn't need to be a creative three-point shooter off the dribble. He doens't need to be a three-level creator for himself. He just needs to pose a threat out of a ball screen. If he can make defenses stress over him probing and stringing out the primary action on the ball, it's going to create so many gaps for him and his teammates to utilize.

He already has star upside. Edgecombe being someone who can adeptly handle the ball in tight spaces and turn pick-and-rolls into one-on-ones, he's going to build up an impressive resume.

Dominick Barlow attacking on the swing pass

We devoted a space to this in last night's game story, but it's worthy of additional acclaim here. Barlow's decisiveness in attacking spaces after the swing pass is a really nice dedvelopment for the Sixers' offense. Consistency is always key. We'll see if this is a flash in the pan. But he's catching and faking DHOs for looping downhill attacks or immediately bursting baseline to attack gaps. It caught Dallas off balance a number of times in this game, allowing Barlow to push to the basket for scores.

His decisions also show an understanding and awareness of the situation. Barlow didn't just commit himself to the drive with reckless abandon, he found the weak link in the defense and attacked them within the flow of the offense.

Nick Nurse leans toward Jared McCain

Whether it was the multiple missed layups early on or just the simple fact that Quentin Grimes never found his rhythm in this game, good on Nurse for recognizing that he didn't have it and giving the lion's share of the third-guard minutes to McCain. The second-year guard was not considerably more productive as a shooter or scorer, but he spaces the floor and makes more reliable decisions. He didn't win them the game by any means, but he didn't go off-script in a harmful way, either.

Adem Bona and Jabari Walker making life difficult on the interior

Speaking of Nurse's lineup choices, he astutely noticed that Andre Drummond was limited in what he could do against Davis and Flagg on defense. So he opted for a smaller, more versatile pairing in Bona and Walker for the final 13 minutes of the game. What they gave up in traditional size, they made up for with athleticism and length. That duo really bothered Dallas' bigs, particularly with switching. They made the Mavericks work really hard for touches and scores at the rim, whether it be fronting or digging in or giving body when those two put the ball on the deck.

It is difficult to watch Klay Thompson

What Klay has done to return to the court after a torn ACL and achilles in the same leg in back-to-back calendar years is an incredible triumph. It is one that would probably lead to life-long limitations for most people. Having said that, it is sad to watch him play. Given the pressure of a contest, the ball comes out of his right hand with no juice or life. It's flat, it's rushed. And you can tell that he knows it. Sad to see from one of the all-time great snipers.