Sixers need more from Tyrese Maxey to compete with Celtics

“I’m just smiling because I’m going to give you the same answer I’ve given you about 17 times over the last two years,” Nurse stated. “He’s got to be more aggressive and take more shots.”

“He’s just got to find them, wherever they are. If it’s transition, if it’s deeper, if it’s more probing, if it’s fadeaways, if it’s turnarounds, if it’s post-ups or whatever it is. I just want him to continue to raise that level of shot attempts and aggressiveness.”

Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla He was happy with his staff’s defensive effort in Game 1. Derrick White began the sport guarding Maxey, however the Celtics additionally experimented with placing longer defenders resembling Jayson Tatum and Jordan Walsh on him at instances.

“He’s a great player, you’re never going to shut him down,” Mazzulla stated. “You have to throw multiple bodies, multiple coverages, you have to guard him one-on-five. I thought our level of connectivity, the five people involved in almost every possession was really important, so I thought we did a good job with that.”

Mazzulla expects a greater effort going ahead. The 76ers shot 4 for 23 from 3-point vary, a stat they’re unlikely to duplicate. The Celtics won the rebounding battle and pressured the 76ers by getting beauty in transition.

“First and foremost, we’ve got to play a lot better in a lot of areas,” Nurse stated. “That’s the biggest thing. We gave up way too much in transition. Gave a lot of iso[lation] baskets up. Just didn’t for whatever reason score well enough, shoot well enough. We’ve got to be better schematically, we’ve got to be more solid on the ball. It’s not just a tweak and adjustment somewhere. “We’ve got to play a lot better.”

There were multiple Game 2 upsets Monday night.

There were multiple Game 2 upsets Monday night. The Knicks lost against Atlanta, and Anthony Edwards powered the Timberwolves to a victory against the Nuggets with a 30-point, 10-rebound double-double.

“We watched the late video games. Both video games went shut within the final three minutes. Just making an attempt to study from the method of how totally different groups execute down the stretch,” Mazzulla said. “Learning as a lot as we are able to. Other than that, a very powerful factor is to deal with us.

“Every game takes on a life of its own. We don’t have control over that. We just have to control how you play, how you execute, and how you move on from each timeout to each timeout, each run to run, each game to game. You’ve just got to play with that consistency.”

Khari Thompson might be reached at khari.thompson@globe.com.