BY HIS own admission, 76ers coach Doug Collins used Spencer Hawes a little longer than he had anticipated on Saturday night, when the starting center returned after missing 10 games with an Achilles' strain.
Hawes responded with a very good outing, collecting 14 points and five rebounds in almost 32 minutes as the Sixers beat the Hawks in Atlanta. More importantly, to Collins and Hawes, was how the 7-footer responded the days after his first game action since Jan. 16.
It appears all is well. In last night's gritty, 95-90 win over the Los Angeles Lakers, Hawes had eight points, five rebounds and five assists in 32-plus minutes while battling against the humongous front line of Andre Bynum and Pau Gasol.
"I feel good," said Hawes. "It feels good not having to come back from a back-to-back and have a day in between to rest. The mornings are kind of the hard part. When I get out of bed, I kind of try and roll out of my bed and hit the foam roller and start stretching right away to get myself in the right mindset. That's kind of just the way it's going to be. We've just got to move forward and stay diligent with getting treatment and try not to shy away from that."
Collins was no doubt thrilled to have back his starting center, especially with such a grueling part of the schedule facing the team.
"He felt good," Collins said. "We were in a game that we wanted to close out, we wanted to win the game. I want to keep his minutes to 27, 26 minutes if we could. Afterwards I looked at the stat sheet and [trainer Kevin Johnson], he had kept giving me the update, 'Spencer's OK, Spencer's OK.' I kept making sure he wasn't playing too much. Do I want to play him that much on a steady diet? The answer is no. Especially since we have to play [last night], Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, Monday - that's too much."
But Collins had to rely on Hawes last night as the Sixers simply wouldn't have been able to stay close without his size. In fact, for the second straight game, Collins often had Hawes and fellow 7-footer Nikola Vucevic on the floor together. Expect to see more of it the rest of the season.
"When you think of the two guys we had out for the longest period of time in Nik and Spencer, when they come in and what they do to our team - they move the ball and the fact that they have more range on their shots opens some things up for us. I was very happy with that. Very."
