Patrick Beverley takes pride in helping integrate new guys, Sixers win
PHILADELPHIA — The Philadelphia 76ers brought in Patrick Beverley in the offseason on a one-year deal, and he has proven a very important piece to the bench unit. He has the highest plus-minus of any player coming off the bench to begin the season, and he has set a tone.
Beverley only had two points in Philadelphia’s 106-103 win over the Boston Celtics on Wednesday, but he had five rebounds and four assists. His work on the defensive end disrupted what Boston wanted to run offensively.
The Sixers seem like a much more cohesive group to begin the 2023-24 season under coach Nick Nurse than in the past under Doc Rivers. That begins with a belief in each other, and Beverley wants to help with that.
“That starts in the locker room,” he stated. “Obviously, they made the trade, big pieces left, so it was up to me to kinda take over the locker room from there and it’s a brand of basketball we play. We play a physical brand. We play hard. We play together. We move the ball. We understand who the ball goes to and we just have each other’s backs. We’ve been defending our asses off the entire season, and there’s no surprise why we’ve been getting wins.”
The trade Beverley referred to is the big James Harden deal. Philadelphia brought in Nic Batum, Robert Covington, Marcus Morris Sr. and KJ Martin, so Beverley is helping get those guys integrated into the system.
“Those are my guys,” Beverley smiled. “Rob was my rookie in Houston. Nico, we’ve been teammates and playing against each other since we was 19 years old. So it’s a breath of fresh air since those guys been here. I expect nothing less. Just winning mentality and impact on and off the bench.”
A win over the Celtics in November is nothing to puff out their chest over, but it is a win that shows the Sixers are here and they are going to battle all season. Then again, Beverley and the Sixers already knew that.
“I don’t think it’s a certain message it sends to us,” he said. “We know exactly who we are. We compete every day. We’re deep as (expletive). We’re really deep. We know what we have. I guess everyone else is kinda finding out right now, but it’s up to us to continue to work hard, stay humble, and keep our heads down and continue to follow the lead of Nick Nurse. So we’ve been doing that.”
