Sixers’ road trip comes to merciful end with loss to Pelicans

What resembled the Sixers lost the final game of a grueling six-game road trip.

As unpleasant as it was, tonight was one of the best results for this team all season.

The Sixers lost their fifth in a row, ending their six-game road trip with a 112-99 loss to the New Orleans Pelicans Monday night. The Toronto Raptors also picked up a win over the Wizards to give them more cushion in the reverse standings.

Justin Edwards and Jared Butler were still able to lead all scorers with 19 points apiece. Guerschon Yabusele went for 12 points and seven rebounds while Chuma Okeke also had 12 and pulled down nine.

Karlo Maktovic led the Pelicans in scoring — he also had 19.

Adem Bona returned after missing the last five with a sprained ankle, but Quentin Grimes was out due to rest. Alex Reese didn’t dress again for two-way reasons, giving the Sixers nine available players. The Pelicans rested a bunch of guys as well, including Zion Williamson and C.J. McCollum.

Here are some grades at the buzzer.

Justin Edwards

For context of how poorly the rest of the team started offensively — only three Sixers field goals were not made by Edwards in the fist quarter, and one of those was the Pelicans accidentally tapping back a missed layup. The hot three-point shooting continued for Edwards though as he was 5-of-9 from deep on the night. That includes one falling out and back in again to give the Sixers a brief lead in the third quarter.

Something he seems to have a really good feel for is knowing if he can shoot over the defender, not rushing himself to get the shot up. He was less effective from inside the arc, but his confidence didn’t waiver as essentially the No. 1 guy.

Grade: A-

Jared Butler

He hadn’t had a very consistent start to his Sixers’ tenure, but it was still surprising to see Butler coming into the game shooting 29% from three with his new team. He didn’t light the world on fire, but he kept getting shots up and get enough to fall to be one of the few Sixers to reach double digits while the game was in hand. He had a hard time getting assists as well as no one could make a shot save for a stretch in the third.

Grade: B+

Adem Bona

It’s no surprise there was little bit of rust coming back. Bona was also thrown to the fire a bit with Yves Missi and Kelly Olynyk punishing the lack of size on both ends of the floor all night. Bona’s matchup with Missi was particularly tough because positioning for defensive rebounding is one of his skills still in need of a bit of refining.

Even he can’t catch a break this year — he got hit in the face on a dunk in the second quarter that took him out of the game for some time. He was able to return thankfully, and throw down a big dunk to show the ankle is feeling better as well.

Grade: C

Marcus Bagley

While he didn’t have much to do in his NBA debut, Bagley was able to score his first points in the league when he scooped up a broken play and got up a floater. He missed the two threes he took and largely blended in otherwise.

It will be interesting to see what the team does with Chuma Okeke, whose 10-day contract is set to expire after this game. They’ve tended to start the cycle over with someone new, but Okeke is the only one who’s really been able to show anything at all in limited time. He had 12 points in the second half of this one, able to hit a pair of threes and a nice up-and-under layup.

Grade: Welcome to the league!

The Sixers finally head back home to host another team racing to the bottom — the Washington Wizards come to town Wednesday at 7 p.m. ET.