By Chris Morris, Sports Talk Philly Staff Writer 
The Sixers kicked off their final four-game road trip of the season with a valiant effort against a talented Clippers team on Sunday. With the help of Shake Milton’s career-high 39 points, the Sixers scratched and clawed to keep the game competitive throughout but in the end, the Clippers’ firepower took over. Three games remain on this west coast swing and although the team’s road woes continued with an eighth consecutive defeat away from Wells Fargo Center, there was some positive momentum built during Sunday’s contest.
In addition to Shake’s 39 points, the Sixers matched a season-high with 21 made threes. Outside of the Christmas Day massacre of the Bucks, this was by far the Sixers' best shooting performance of the season. This will need to be a trend if the Sixers are going to finish out this road trip in a positive way. Tuesday’s matchup with the West-leading Lakers will surely present challenges. Joel Embiid will end up missing both games against the Lakers this season, which has to be a bummer for him. The Sixers will be forced to spread out and take and make threes if they are going to be competitive against the Lakers since they do not have the inside scoring presence of Embiid or Ben Simmons to rely on.
Guarding Lebron James will most certainly be the most difficult task. I expect Tobias Harris and Al Horford to draw most of this responsibility. It is going to be tough for the Sixers to slow down the Lakers’ scoring attack. This is why they must be willing to pull the trigger from deep to have any chance of staying in the game. The Sixers have fared well out in LA the past few years and while this version of the Lakers is better than recent ones, I expect the Sixers to compete on Tuesday night and carry that momentum from Sunday with them into this game.
The final two games are against not exactly the cream of the crop in the West. The Kings and Warriors have not won many games this season but both will present challenges. The Kings have a plethora of athletic young guards at their disposal. Already without Ben Simmons, the Sixers then lost Josh Richardson who suffered a concussion in the Clippers game and will miss at least Tuesday’s contest. Being without Simmons and Richardson would pose a big problem against the Kings and the likes of De’Aaron Fox, Buddy Hield, and Bogdan Bogdanovic. The Kings do not play a lot of defense but they can fill up the scoreboard so expect another high scoring affair in that matchup.
The Warriors, as we all know, are a far cry from the championship team they had in recent years. However, with Steph Curry’s return looming, there will be some upbeat energy surrounding the team. Luckily, it does not look like Curry will be back in time for the game against the Sixers this Saturday. Even if he is, they still have enough depth and young talent to give the Sixers some fits. Like the Kings, the Warriors employ a multitude of young guards and wings. None are particularly proven commodities, but they all play hard and compete from start to finish.
If the Sixers want to still push for home-court advantage in the first round of the playoffs, picking up a few road wins will be essential. They are already 0-1 on this road trip and while there is no shame in losing to the Clippers without 3 of your 5 starters, losses to teams like the Kings and Warriors would only add to the inability of this team to beat anyone away from home. Somehow, I believe the Sixers will snap this 8 game road losing skid with wins against the Kings and Warriors to finish out the trip, preceded by a loss to the Lakers. Finishing 2-2 on a west coast road trip without Simmons, Embiid, and possibly Richardson would be a win and something this team could build on down the stretch as they start to get healthy.
