Brown begins the task of shaping Noel

The 12 years that Brett Brown spent with the San Antonio Spurs form so much of his frame of reference as an NBA coach that it's a challenge for him to see Nerlens Noel for what he finally is: a functioning pro basketball player.

When Brown joined them in 1998 and, after two years in Australia, rejoined them in 2002, the Spurs were already fully formed into the league's model for basketball operation, rising into an elite franchise and remaining there ever since. They had Tim Duncan and David Robinson. They would get Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili. They got to the mountaintop and stayed there for years thereafter.

They did all that on talent, of course, but also, over time, through the night-after-night pounding and the lessons that only basketball's highest level can teach. The 76ers' home opener Saturday against the Miami Heat marked the third NBA game, and the first at the Wells Fargo Center, of Noel's career, and in so many ways he is the perfect symbol of the franchise: the promise and uncertainty of the future, the physical and emotional maturation that must yet take place for those players who will be part of the team's core.

"It's a real eye-opener for me where, in my old job, you saw just hardened men, veterans, who knew how to navigate 82 games," said Brown, the Sixers' head coach. "It's such a skill, a mind-set, a toughness, that people have the ability to back things up, and that's life in the NBA. Our group has to learn that now. Nerlens has to learn that now, and I'm very curious."

After sitting out all of last season to recover from knee surgery, after appearing in just four of the Sixers' eight preseason games this year, after collecting 14 points and 10 rebounds in a terrific Friday night performance in Milwaukee, Noel was sluggish and all but irrelevant in a 114-96 loss. He had two points, five rebounds, and too many moments when he held his hands on his hips in a sure sign of fatigue, and it was clear how much playing back-to-back nights, a common and manageable burden in the NBA, had taken out of him.

"It was definitely an adjustment," he said. "I never really played back to back, except in AAU and high school. I've got to make sure my body is getting used to it, and I think it's only a matter of time."

Noel played 35 minutes Friday against the Bucks, and he was a sight to see, fast and springy on his feet, giving those glimpses that showed why the Sixers had been willing to trade an all-star guard in Jrue Holiday for him, then wait a year from him to heal. But Saturday against the Heat, against a team with size and experience and shooting ability, he was something else again.

Brown had lamented before the game that he had done Noel no favors by playing him so much in Milwaukee, but while he played Noel just 25 minutes Saturday, he gave him no quarter during Noel's time on the floor. With nine minutes left in the fourth quarter and the Sixers down just four points, Noel didn't look for a backdoor pass off a pick-and-roll, and the turnover and Noel's late, slow jog back to the other end of the floor led to a Heat field goal and a Brown timeout.

Before Noel entered the huddle, Brown put his hand against the rookie's chest to stop him, then shouted into his ear for a full minute. He did the same to Michael Carter-Williams last season, and he'll continue doing it to Noel this season, because he views himself as the crucible that will form these soft kids into true professionals.

"They need to be coached. I need to coach them," Brown said. "And he gets it. It's something where, defensively, it was getting a little too easy, and the group - you could just feel it. . . . That is a difficult team to guard, and as a group, we had a hard time guarding them. And Nerlens, in that instance, was part of it, and life moves on. . . .

"I'm going to blame it, or lend a little bit of an excuse, on fatigue and back-to-back. But that's the way it goes. That ain't good enough. That's the job we all have. You've got to learn to back stuff up. You physically have to be ready and capable of backing things up."

Noel isn't, and he may not be for a while, and nights like Saturday are a sobering reminder that the process is long, its end uncertain. From where Brett Brown is standing - and yes, from where Nerlens Noel and everyone else around the Sixers is standing - that mountaintop is still so high and far away.

@MikeSielski