News and Features

DiLeo continues to stress defense, fast break points

The first 14 games have been somewhat of a whirlwind for Head Coach Tony DiLeo - everything from a five-game, nine-day West Coast road swing to the injury to starting forward Elton Brand - but he has guided the 76ers to an 8-6 mark after Sunday’s win at Atlanta pushed their current win streak to four games.

It is a streak that has featured two hallmarks of DiLeo’s philosophy for the Sixers: Defense and fast-break points. At one point during the current win streak (the win over Houston), the Sixers ran out to a season-high 29 fast break points, which further solidified their place atop the league leaders in that category at 20.4 per game.

“I think the major factor with that is our defense is getting better,” DiLeo said. “We're contesting more shots, we're getting more rebounds, we're getting more steals, so consequently we're getting out on the break better.

“We're also trying after made baskets to get the ball in play as fast we as can and get down the floor to get a good shot before the defense is able to set up.”

And so far, it is paying off in dividends. The Sixers are averaging 8.0 steals per game (up from 7.3 in the 23 games prior to his arrival) and limiting opponents to just 44.8 rebounds per game (down from 48.5 per game), both of which are allowing the team to get out and run.

“We always focus on defense first, so we're going to continue to work on defense; we want to be one of the better defensive teams in the league,” DiLeo said. “That will be the number one priority because that ignites our fast break and we definitely want to continue to get out in the open floor.

“That’s what we want 76ers basketball to continue to become: An aggressive defensive team that gets out on the break for some easy baskets in transition.”

Getting out in the open floor has allowed the Sixers to improve their overall team field goal percentage to 49.4% shooting (528-1069) and their points per game to nearly 100 per game (up from 93.3 points per game in the first 23 games of the season). All while going up against opponents with a combined record during the time of play of 202-177 (.533) - during the six-game road trip the opponents - combined record was 110-72 (.604) - without the services of Brand.

“We played high-level competition without our starting power forward and we were competitive in almost every game [we lost],” DiLeo said. “I thought our defensive principles were good, team defense was getting better and we were executing much better in the half-court offense. Plus, we cut down on turnovers.”

To the point where the Sixers have committed only 15.2 turnovers per game under DiLeo, down from 16.0 per game before his arrival, while assists have shot up to 22.0 per game - an assist-to-turnover ratio of 1.45:1. Andre Miller’s assists per game have gone up from 5.7 to 7.1 since DiLeo took the helm, and one of the beneficiaries has been Iguodala, who’s scoring average has gone from 14.9 points per game up to 20 under DiLeo.

“Andre Miller is a great point guard,” DiLeo said. “He sees everything out on the court, so if the defense makes a mistake he can take advantage of it. And I think because our execution is getting better, he can put defenders in difficult positions where he’s able to get us easy baskets.

“As far as Andre Iguodala, I think we're getting the ball to him in areas were he's comfortable and he's just performing and executing from there. We expect both of them to continue at that level and when we do get Elton Brand back it will just make our team even stronger.”

Brand is progressing as expected and is currently on pace for an estimated return time of mid-January, consistent with the initial projection released by the team. He is currently participating in contact drills and will be re-evaluated later this week.

Sixers President and General Manager told the Philadelphia Daily News, “What I want to happen when Elton comes back is that we continue to play the same way and that Elton fits in. Elton will figure it out. He was averaging 16 points and 10 rebounds when he got hurt; he knew what he was getting into. As time progresses, he'll get more and more comfortable, and they'll get more comfortable with him.”