Sixers lose battle of size in afternoon clash with Heat

Philadelphia — Quentin Grimes needs his pregame nap.

He estimates that he can knock out for two, maybe 2.5 hours of nap time on a game day.

He planned to sleep through the night as Saturday transitioned to Suday. There was no time to nap. His team had a 1 p.m., Eastern time, tip-off.

He, like many athletes, is a creature of habit. Sunday compromised everyone's habit, but it didn't mean Grimes couldn't get his four or five over-easy eggs and pancakes in.

The disrupted game-day routine is only a thing if you make it a thing.

It certainly did not matter to the Miami Heat.

It did not matter that Tyler Herro, Terry Rozier and Andrew Wiggins were all out for the Heat. Miami had one distinct advantage — size. They had size inside with Bam Adebayo and Kel'el Ware. They had size at forward with Jaime Jaquez Jr. 

They had a gunner in Norman Powell, who does not need much to happen for his fuse to light.

Miami began digging Philadelphia's hole early. Ware had eight points and eight rebounds — six offensive — in his first 8:43 of play. 

The Heat built an 11-point lead on his back. It took Nick Nurse too long to resort to zone defense.

Philadelphia struggled to contain line-drive penetration from the perimeter. Pedestrian offensive players like Davion Mitchell had no trouble finding gaps to get into the paint. The rotations to help thwart those drives left the rim exposed, and Ware went to work. He powered Miami's second-shot offense to the early advantage.

As they always do, the Sixers made inroads in the second quarter. Their run hinged on Paul George switching onto Jaquez.

Miami is surgical in executing its strategy. Always has been. The Heat recognized that Jaquez's size advantage made him a viable option for bully ball off the dribble. Whether he caught the rock out of the post or on the perimeter, he forced his way into the paint. The pressure on his mismatches led to shading toward the ball in help, leaving Heat shooters open one or two passes away.

George kept Jaquez quiet for a while, and it stalled out the Heat offense.

But that was perhaps George's most impactful stint of the game. His three-point range was on a delayed flight back from Milwaukee. The only scoring he did came at the foul line and around the paint.

In a game that VJ Edgecombe missed due to left calf tightness, Philadelphia needed Grimes' best stuff.

It was one of his worst games of the season thus far.

He picked up his fifth foul with more than eight minutes to play in the third quarter. Grimes was over-aggressive on a Norman Powell wing three, inexplicably swiping at his head on a contest that granted the Heat guard a three-shot foul. He fouled him again on a corner three early in the third quarter.

Grimes did some scoring, but a handful of his shots came outside the flow of the offense.

It doesn't necessarily take a ton to replicate Edgecombe's offensive offering, but the defense was undisciplined. Philadelphia needed more out of him.

Edgecombe reported the calf discomfort after Thursday's win in Milwaukee. He showed up on the injury report on Saturday evening and was officially ruled out at pregame media availability.

Nurse told reporters that imaging was done and it came back clean. His absence was precautionary.

To make matters worse for the defense, Nurse and his staff opted to use up George's remaining minutes over the final eight minutes of the third quarter. They liked the way he matched up with Jaquez, so they rolled the dice in the third and lived with the result in the fourth.

The fourth quarter told the entire story of the game. Miami outscored Philadelphia in the paint by 20. The Sixers were outscored by nine off turnovers.

When it came down to the final 12 minutes, the Sixers didn't get stops in the paint. The offense was sloppy. Miami's tempo and mass won out.

More meaningful for the Sixers' big picture, Jared McCain looked his best since returning from what was nearly a year-long layoff. He's starting to feel moments of explosion out of his legs. He's feeling more comfortable leveraging his physicality on both ends of the floor. McCain transferred energy from his lower body to his upper body quite well on jumpers.

He scored 15 points on 11 shots in early 26 minutes of action. McCain laced three of his four attempts from beyond the arc.

Philadelphia needs his offensive juice to take pressure off Tyrese Maxey. They will need him more if Maxey has to miss any time. The star guard stretched and grabbed at his right shoulder throughout the first quarter. He departed the game — albeit in "garbage time" — and immediately went back to the locker room, grabbing at his shoulder as he disappeared into the tunnel.

Nurse noticed that it was bothering Maxey, too. The Sixers star was evaluated at halftime and was deemed able to play through it. They will continue to evaluate the shoulder, but there was no update as of Nurse's postgame media availability.

The uncertainty surrounding Joel Embiid has to put pressure on the health of everyone else. Philadelphia cannot afford any extended absence from Maxey, if he has to miss time at all.

There is no update as of this writing. It may ultimately be nothing.

But this boat will sink fast if it's not. At 9-7, the average outcome of their games is a 1.5-point win.

It is not ideal. But it's life in late November.