NEW YORK - Failure to hold a lead? Phooey. A discrepancy in trips to the foul line? Forget about it. What dogged the 76ers Sunday, in a 95-92 loss to Brooklyn, was their inability to win on the road.
The defeat, in a game that represented the start of an eight-game roadtrip, left the Sixers with six consecutive losses in games away from home. That's a slight problem for them, considering they won't play in their friendly South Philly confines again for another 17 days.
"They beat us at the free-throw line. We beat them everywhere else. It kind of hurt us," said Jrue Holiday.
The Nets also beat the Sixers in the win column, which probably hurt the most.
Lost in the clutter of another road loss were big efforts from Holiday, who totaled 24 points, nine assists and six rebounds, and Thad Young, who logged consecutive double-doubles with 18 points and 10 assists. Evan Turner had a nice night, too, with 15 points and seven boards.
The only stat that matters for the Sixers these days is wins, and they have only one of those in their last seven times out.
Brooklyn (14-12), which had lost three straight coming into the game, overcame an eight-point deficit in the first quarter and never looked back. Whenever the Sixers (13-15) seemed to inch closer, in the form of one- or two-point deficits, the Nets fired right back.
A perfect example was provided by Brooklyn's Joe Johnson, who took a tight game and with one long-range shot cast some doubt upon the Sixers when he banked in a 27-footer before the buzzer sounded to signal the end of the third quarter. Johnson scored 10 of his 22 points in the third.
"Joe Johnson's close to the third quarter, I think he had eight - two 3s and a two," said Sixers coach Doug Collins. "I talked to our guys about understanding and finishing up quarters. `Who's the most dangerous guy on the floor?' We helped off a drive in the middle, a drive-and-kick, gave him a 3, gave him a 2 and then let him walk into a 3 to end the quarter.
"Those are mistakes you can't make on the road."
They're mistakes the Sixers have seemed to make in abundance of late. They haven't picked up a road victory since Nov. 30 at Charlotte.
The Sixers' bid to get their roadtrip off to a winning start looked promising midway through the first, when they opened the game scoring 12 of the first 16 points. At that stage, the lead probably should've been greater, with Brooklyn missing all but two of 11 attempts.
Their failure to make good on early opportunities came back to bite the Sixers later in the first.
Brooklyn went on an 18-0 run, closing out the first quarter by shooting 7-for-8 from the field to take a 24-17 lead. All the while, the Sixers shot 2-for-12 and couldn't seem to buy a bucket.
"They made shots and got going. That was pretty much it," said Turner.
In the second quarter, Collins called for something his team previously had done on only 15 possessions this season: Play zone defense. Rolling into a 1-2-2, with Evan Turner playing up high on the Nets' Deron Williams, the Sixers went to zone on a handful of Brooklyn's trips up the floor in the second quarter, and to a degree of success.
A 10-4 run, coupled with Brooklyn's suddenly cold shooting, helped the Sixers' trim their 10-point deficit to two at halftime, 43-41.
The Sixers on four occasions in the third and four more in the fourth cut the Nets' advantage to one possession, but they shot 0-for-4 when they had a chance to take their first lead since the first quarter. Once, Holiday air-balled a mid-range jumper. Another chance, Spencer Hawes clanged a baseline look.
Complicating matters was the Sixers' proclivity for avoiding the free-throw line. Ranking next-to-last in free-throw attempts at the game's outset, the Sixers went 8-for-10 at the line while the Nets knocked down 21 of their 30 attempts at the stripe.
Not even a Dorell Wright 3-pointer that cut their deficit to two with under a minute to go could save the Sixers.
"You let them get to the free-throw line and that's what happens," Turner said.
That's the lesson for the Sixers. The hope is that they have learned from it, in order to prevent their eight-game trip from becoming a season-altering one.
Visit Christopher A. Vito's Sixers blog at delcotimes.com for more coverage.
TWO THUMBS UP
**Thad Young with another huge double-double.
**Joe Johnson shed every defender the Sixers threw at him.
TWO THUMBS DOWN
**Jason Richardson couldn't stay out of foul trouble.
**Jerry Stackhouse is a shell of himself. Has been for a while.