Sixers-Wolves: An unconventional lineup shines, forwards step up, and more of what we learned from their 115-103 win

The 76ers picked up a big 115-103 win over the Minnesota Timberwolves on Friday in the first leg of their back-to-back, maintaining their grasp on the sixth seed in the East.

Here’s what we learned from the Sixers’ latest win:

» READ MORE: Sixers’ stars balanced scoring powers a 115-103 win over the Timberwolves

Dominick Barlow isn’t a flashy scorer, but he’s doing everything else right. The Sixers got off to a slow shooting start, but Barlow extended possessions with three first quarter offensive rebounds, four defensive rebounds, and a block.

Ever since Joel Embiid returned to the lineup from injury, coach Nick Nurse said he’s noticed Barlow’s game continue to improve.

“He’s doing a lot, never getting much done,” Nurse said on the difference between Barlow’s play with and without Embiid. “You see him crashing and never getting his hands on anything, and all of a sudden he’s getting his hands on everything again, and really playing good defense, too.”

Barlow helped keep the Sixers afloat early, and then Nurse turned to Kelly Oubre Jr. to close the game late. Oubrescored the Sixers’ final nine points to slow a late Timberwolves run and secure the win.

The Sixers know Oubre and Barlow are both capable of providing starter-quality minutes. Even coming off the bench on Friday, Oubre scored 21 points on 8-for-12 shooting.

“Every night is a little different as far as what comes your way and what doesn’t, but at the end of the day, I’m locked in,” Oubre said. “I want to do what I can to help this team win. Since I’ve been here, I’ve been a Swiss Army Knife, been able to just pull out anything out of the pocket.”

To end the third quarter, Nurse put Andre Drummond in the lineup alongside Embiid, and that unconventional approach was plus-9 across 2 minutes, 4 seconds, ending the quarter with the Sixers up 12 points and gathering their largest lead of the night.

The Sixers broke the game open in the third, going on a 42-24 run. Drummond’s minutes in the third and fourth quarter helped the Sixers out on the glass and against Rudy Gobert, who scored just five points.

» READ MORE: From Nigeria to the NBA: Adem Bona’s journey from soccer-crazed kid to Sixers energy boost

The two-big lineup is something Nurse has tried a bit with Embiid and Adem Bona as well. It was on Nurse’s radar for tonight, but he didn’t decide to give it a shot until late into the contest.

“I had an idea of doing it tonight, because they usually have a couple of bigs in there,” Nurse said. “It was presenting itself when I was getting ready to put [Drummond] in, and then as [Drummond] was waiting to go in for him, [Embiid] hit a couple back-to-back shots.”

After a Wednesday game against the Washington Wizards that Oubre described as a “pickup game,” the Sixers made big improvements on defense against the Timberwolves.

Wolves star Anthony Edwards was still recovering from an illness that kept him out of Thursday’s loss to the Detroit Pistons, which helped the Sixers out on defense. But they also made improvements of their own to minimize the rest of Minnesota’s offense.

“We just matched their physicality,“ Paul George said. ”I thought we played harder. I thought we did a better job one-on-one guarding and on their key guys. I thought we did a great job of shrinking the floor."