But at times they were pretty good and held a 75-70 lead with 7 minutes, 27 seconds remaining. That's when the defensive brain cramps started popping up. Houston's Kevin Martin, who scored 14 of his 16 points in the final quarter, drained a long three-pointer on a blown defensive assignment. That seemed to jump-start the Rockets. Cardinal Dougherty and Villanova product Kyle Lowry put the game away with two basket-and-foul three-point plays in the final 2 minutes.
"Once again, we started out the game, hit our first shot then hit two of our next 17," said coach Doug Collins. "It's just mind-boggling how you go through stretches like that. We gave them 32 points in the fourth quarter. That's not going to get it done on the road.
"I thought we made two critical errors on Kevin Martin that cost us. We had him well in hand, I think he had two points going into the fourth quarter. We made a mental mistake and went under him on a handoff and he hit a three, and then he hit a long three and our whole thing was make him dribble the ball. And then Kyle Lowry made three good plays and that was the difference in the game."
Another critical aspect was that Sixers point guard Jrue Holiday, who had been the teams' biggest offensive weapon the past two games with 42 points combined, played just 22 minutes due to foul trouble.
Holiday picked up two fouls in the first quarter and had to leave the game. When he entered again in the second, he almost immediately picked up his third when he quizzically committed a clear-path foul.
