That’s three near double-doubles in the last week, but Allen (like the rest of the Sixers bigs) doesn’t play physical enough and he got eaten alive by Scola and Gortat.  When he cut the PHX lead to 60-59 on a 19-footer with 6:34 left in 3rd Q, I thought Sixers would pull this one out, but they simply could not get that next basket.

Last night I couldn’t decide overall whether or not Turner was forcing things too much or was simply unlucky.  He got a lot of clean/close/good looks and just could not get the ball to drop.  That’s unlucky in my opinion.  However I could be convinced that he was dropping his head too frequently last night and did a mediocre job of finding teammates.

A triple-double is amazing, but take a closer look at the stats and you’ll see why Holiday did not get an “A”.  He scored 16 points on an inefficient 16 FGAs (6-16 = 37.5%) and turned the ball over 6 times. And while his late 4th Q defense was outstanding, during most of the game, the tenacious Dragic made Jrue look slow and uninterested.

Uggghhh…He’s only a starter because of DC’s respect for his veteran leadership.

A solid outing from Wright who seems to have rediscovered his scoring touch after taking the night off vs. GSW a couple games ago.  The alley-oop he caught from Jrue that cut the lead to 87-85 with 2 mins. remaining was a thing of beauty.  He also hit a huge 3-pointer in the late 3rd Q.

Just a terrible shooting night by Spence.  When you’re a big that doesn’t rebound well or play solid defense, you have to provide some scoring punch and Spence failed to do that last night.

Irrelevant.

This is exactly the role I want to see NY cast in by DC.  One or two less running leaners and he would have gotten an A+ from me.

Did anyone else catch Kwame dancing to Gangnam Style??  That about sums up his time here in Philly.

DC should not have waited until the 4 min mark of the 3rd to get Wright back into the game.  Also why the hell is Holiday on the bench for so long in the 4th.  I can’t believe I am saying this, why did Kwame get no burn last night?  DC claims he is the Sixers “physical” big man yet did not see fit to put him in the game as the PHX bangers were knocking our guys all over the place.  Finally, playing a short bench vs. LAL came back to haunt us last night in the 2nd game of the notorious road B2B.

He was effective and efficient in limited minutes tonight.  He also deserves some propers for overseeing Dwight Howard’s dreadful 1-for-7 effort.

Thad struggled from midrange on Tuesday.  Despite getting reasonably good looks throughout the evening, he was just 1-of-8 from beyond three feet.

Tremendous night for Mr. Turner.  After a brutal three game stretch to close 2012 (he shot 7-of-25 and averaged just 5 points per game), he stuffed the box score in a way that he’s uniquely capable of; posting his eighth double-double of the season.  Plus: the 3-pointer he hit to push the lead to 92-85 after Kobe galvanized the crowd was super-sized.

In a triumphant return to his hometown, Jrue was terrific.  The driving dunk he made with 22 seconds left that put the Lakers down six and, effectively, iced it, might be my favorite Jrue Holiday moment ever.  Also: 10 assists against one turnover.  Think on that.

Jason Richardson is three years younger than Kobe Bryant.  It didn’t look that way.

While Wright was on the floor, he hit 3-point shots (especially helpful because of the extra point you get for them!) and grabbed rebounds.  Doug Collins, seeing this, played him a grand total of 23 minutes.

Spencer Hawes, sporting a fresh haircut that made him (finally) look more like a professional athlete than a cast member of MTV’s ‘Buckwild’, did good things against the Lakers for the second time in as many games.  He blocked Dwight Howard at least twice and has now shot 12-of-21 against the Lake show this season.

Kwame Brown, who wasn’t (that) bad in LA, got booed when he stepped on the floor at Staples.  Kind of makes you wonder what the fans do when he returns to Washington: threaten his family?  Throw fruit at him?

Swaggy, who was playing for the home team the last time he played in front of an LA crowd, was unusually cautious against the Lakers, hazarding just three shots.