Nick Nurse delivers clear message after Sixers’ latest lackluster effort: ‘We’ve got to be professional’

Maybe it was how it happened that set off Nick Nurse. The 76ers coach was clearly disappointed with his team’s loss and general approach.

“Obviously, just the overall vibe was pretty poor from the start,” a spent-looking Nurse said Monday after a 142-110 beating by the Chicago Bulls at the Wells Fargo Center. “I think that giving up 39 [points], almost 40 again in the first quarter just kind of set the tone for the game, and just didn’t seem to have a lot of energy or life or vibe tonight.”

» READ MORE: Sixers drop eighth straight game with 142-110 blowout loss to the Chicago Bulls

This isn’t the first time Nurse has been critical of the Sixers’ effort. But on this night, players looked like they had no interest in playing. The lack of effort left them trailing by as many as 50 points to a tanking squad on the Sixers' home court.

So what does Nurse think was the cause of the lifeless performance?

“Obviously, we are just not handling the [injury] situations that are going on with guys in and out,” he said. “We tried to handle it at different times this year. Just right now, we are not handling it very well.”

Joel Embiid missed his 38th game of the season after undergoing testing on his ailing left knee. All in all, the Sixers (20-37) were without five players due to injuries. Two more players — Guerschon Yabusele (corneal abrasion in right eye and swelling in left eye) and Quentin Grimes (right knee tendinitis) — left the game in the third quarter.

But the Bulls (23-35) were also undermanned, playing without four players, including two-time All-Star center and former Sixer Nikola Vučević (calf) and Patrick Williams (right quadriceps tendinitis).

» READ MORE: Sixers’ Joel Embiid misses game against Bulls, but not to point of being shut down for rest of season

So Nurse had a message for his players after they suffered their eighth straight loss.

“I just said, ‘There’s a lot of games left, and we’ve got to be professional,’” Nurse said of the remaining 25 games. “‘We’ve got to go out and play. First of all, each and everybody needs to look at themselves, and what they can do better, and then look at what they can do better for the team. And do our jobs, man, be professional.’”

Asked if he agreed with Nurse’s statement, Paul George responded: “You can always be more professional. I think that’s a pretty general statement. We can always be more professional.”

Said Tyrese Maxey: “At the end of the day, we’ve got to do a job. You’ve got to be professional about it. We all know that was unacceptable of all of us tonight. That’s about it.”

Based on the team’s lackluster effort, the Sixers appear to be an emotionally spent and directionless group that has given up on the season.

But there was some pushback against the notion that they’ve checked out.

“I don’t want to believe that,” George said. “I don’t sense that in this locker room, and I don’t want to believe that.”

» READ MORE: Doctors discuss ‘radical’ surgeries for Joel Embiid that could sideline him for as much as a year

Maxey just thinks Monday’s game got away from the Sixers, and it was hard to come back from that.

“Every time I lace my shoes up, I lace my shoes up to win,” he said. “That’s just how I feel. I’m never going to sit here and lace my shoes up to lose. That’s not how I’m wired. That’s not how I play basketball. That’s not how I live my life.”

What about some of his teammates? Does Maxey get a sense that they have checked out?

“I’m not going to say that,” he said. “I wouldn’t say that. I feel like it’s my job to make sure that we go out there and compete extremely hard and I’ll do a better job of that.”