Sixers takeaways: Surviving a blown call, grabbing a much-needed home win over Rockets and more

The 76ers were fortunate that a blown goaltending call didn’t doom them.

In response, the Sixers (24-19) showed they can win a meaningful game at the Xfinity Mobile Arena.

And they did that despite, once again, surrendering a high-scoring performance to an opposing player.

All those things stood out in Thursday’s 128-122 overtime victory over the Houston Rockets.

Tyrese Maxey led the Sixers with 36 points, 10 assists, and four steals. Joel Embiid added 32 points, 15 rebounds, 10 assists, and two blocks for his ninth career triple-double. And Kelly Oubre Jr. finished with 26 points on 10-for-14 shooting — including 4 of 5 from three-point range — to go with four rebounds, three assists, one steal, and a block in a hard-fought victory.

But with the score tied at 115 with three seconds remaining in regulation, Maxey’s layup attempt bounced off the backboard and in the direction of the rim. That’s when Houston Rockets small forward swatted the ball away for an obvious goaltending.

Luckily for the Sixers, the game went to overtime, and they pulled out a six-point victory.

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But …

“That was bad,” Paul George said. “It was a double goaltend. Yeah, that was bad. Luckily, basketball gods were on our side to win the game tonight. But yeah, that was a bad no-call.”

Nick Nurse said he doesn’t always have the greatest view. But on this night, the no-call occurred in front of the Sixers’ bench.

“And I think Tyrese almost, on purpose, tried to get it to the backboard extra quick,” Nurse said. “Like he almost threw it into the backboard real quick. I mean, listen, they are supposed to call those if there’s any chance at all there’s a goaltend, because they can review it. They can’t review it if they don’t call it. So they can get it right.

“I’ve actually been in games with those guys that they’ve called them more than two or three times. You get it when they call it. But they didn’t. I guess they just thought it was too far under, or they didn’t see it. So they didn’t call it.”

Maxey responded “nope” when asked if the official gave him an explanation on the no-call.

So what was his reaction?

“Just get to overtime and try to win it there. That’s it,” he said. “I just was surprised. I kind of like laid it on the backboard. But it happens, man. We’re all humans.”

Maxey scored six of his points and tallied two of his steals in the extra session, leading the Sixers to victory.

Kelly Oubre Jr. said it was hard to let that blown call go in order to focus on overtime.

“But that’s why you have a 15-man roster,” he said. “Everybody kind of collectively [kept the team focused]. But it started with Kyle [Lowry]. You know in his prime, he was the biggest complainer of them all, right? But when you have a guy who accomplished so much and is who’s so just witty and witty and smart, and he knows the game. He just rallied us all and told us just to forget about it. We got five more minutes to go in the basketball game."

The Sixers’ home arena has been far from a safe haven. Heading into Thursday, they had lost five of their last seven home games and were 11-12 at this building. The fifth-place squad and 10th-place Atlanta Hawks (7-13) are the Eastern Conference’s only top 10 teams without winning home records.

Jabari Walker was asked following Thursday’s shootaround if there was a sense within the Sixers’ locker room that they need to start winning some of their home games.

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“That’s always been like that,” he said. “I don’t think there’s any extra pressure, recently. That’s always been the standard. … We are just going to continue to rely on the attitude that we’ve had. And I think we will bounce back.”

And they did just that with a victory over one of the league’s best teams.

“That was huge,” Nurse said. “We needed a good home win. We needed … to beat somebody really good. We needed a good, tough close-game win. Hopefully, we can get some momentum off of it.

“We certainly need to play better at home.”

The Sixers will conclude their current six-game homestand at 3 p.m. Saturday against the New York Knicks. After facing the Charlotte Hornets on Monday in North Carolina, they’ll return to Philly for another three-game homestand.

They’ll host the Milwaukee Bucks on Tuesday in the second game of a back-to-back before entertaining the Sacramento Kings (Jan. 29) and New Orleans Pelicans (Jan. 31).

The Sixers must find a way to keep racking up wins at home, where they are supposed to have an advantage. They blew golden opportunities to take advantage of home-court advantage in recent losses to the Cavs on Jan. 14 and 16, and to the Phoenix Suns on Tuesday.

Unfortunately for them, those losses weren’t surprising after losing home games to the tanking Brooklyn Nets on Dec. 23 and the depleted Denver Nuggets on Jan. 5. The Nuggets were without their entire starting lineup and eight players total.

Right now, the Sixers are better on the road, where they’re 12-7. While the road record is impressive, they need to play much better at home. And as Nurse said, beating the Rockets was a good starting point.

We shouldn’t be surprised that Durant torched the Sixers for 36 points.

The 6-foot-11, 240-pound forward is the 2014 MVP, a four-time scoring champion, an 11-time All-NBA selection, and a 15-time All-Star. He came into Tuesday’s game with a career scoring average of 27.2 points. And scored at least 30 points in 14 games played.

To add to that, the Sixers have had a knack for allowing high-scoring performances from opposing players. So Durant’s performance was just part of a trend.

Boston Celtics swingman Jaylen Brown (32 points), Washington Wizards center Alex Sarr (31), Cleveland Cavaliers shooting guard Donovan Mitchell (46 and 35), Milwaukee Bucks point guard Ryan Rollins (32), Miami Heat shooting guard Norman Powell (32), Orlando Magic point guard Anthony Black (31), Atlanta Hawks forward Jalen Johnson (41), Memphis Grizzlies point guard Ja Morant (40), New York Knicks point guard Jalen Brunson (31), Orlando shooting guard Desmond Bane (31) and Cleveland point guard Jaylen Tyson (39) were the others who scored at least 30 against the Sixers.