NEW YORK — After the Brooklyn Nets had sliced the 76ers’ lead to 12 points entering Sunday’s fourth quarter, coach Nick Nurse dialed up a Trendon Watford post-up play.
Watford said the set was actually designed for him to help get Tyrese Maxey or Quentin Grimes an open shot. But Nurse also encouraged Watford to be aggressive with the ball in his hands, and he sank the turnaround hook shot to ignite the Sixers’ dominant final period.
“That was a good answer to kind of stop the run,” Nurse said of Watford’s bucket. “That’s nice when you’ve got somebody that can do that.”
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It was a glimpse of the versatility the Sixers envisioned Watford could bring when they signed him as a free agent this past summer. After missing the preseason and first three regular-season games with a lingering hamstring injury, Watford stuffed Sunday’s box score with 16 points on 7-of-9 shooting, nine rebounds, and seven assists in the Sixers’ comfortable 129-105 victory at Barclays Center to improve to 5-1 in the early season. And it was poetic that Watford’s best performance as a Sixer came against his former team, after spending the previous two seasons with the Nets.
“It was just trying to get my flow back, get my rhythm back,” Watford said after the game. “[There were] just a lot of teammates behind me, and telling me to be aggressive and be me.”
Watford credited Nets coach Jordi Fernandez with allowing him to frequently run those types of post-ups with Brooklyn last season, when he averaged a career-high 10.2 points and 2.6 assists. On Sunday night, he also slung a second-quarter pass to VJ Edgecombe for a high-flying dunk, then hollered in celebration with the rookie. In the third period, Watford pump-faked outside the three-point line, drew a double team while backing down his defender, then found Grimes for the deep shot. Later, Watford initiated a fast break, dished to Grimes, and got the ball back for the conversion through contact.
Perhaps Watford’s best sequence came in the fourth quarter, when he hit a corner three-pointer, blocked Brooklyn’s Zhaire Williams outside the arc on the Nets’ ensuing possession, then drove to the opposite basket and found teammate Andre Drummond for the underneath finish.
“He’s just a Swiss Army knife out there for us,” said Grimes, who has known Watford since they were teenagers. “ … He’s always been like that. A bigger guy. He’s not that athletic, but his feel is definitely off the charts.”
In the Sixers’ locker room before the game, Maxey jokingly asked Watford if he viewed his first matchup against the Nets as a “revenge game.” Watford initially downplayed that characterization, but then conceded afterward that “actually, I will call it a revenge game.”
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Onlookers could see him chirping at the Nets’ bench, then motioning for a Fernandez timeout when Maxey buried a three-pointer less than a minute into the second quarter. Yet Watford also enjoyed catching up with his former teammates and arena staffers. He hung around for several minutes after the final buzzer, occasionally wading into the home crowd for autographs or photos.
“It was good to be back,” Watford said.
Not just back in Brooklyn, but back on the court.
Watford hurt his hamstring a couple of weeks before training camp began in late September, while executing “a simple move that I always do” during a pickup game in Philly. It was an unfortunate early setback for the 6-foot-9 forward on a new team revamping its offensive system. The nature of such an injury forced Watford to stop running or doing any conditioning drills, meaning “you get pretty much all the way out of shape.” He also had to delay building on-court timing and chemistry with teammates. He had taken only four shots in his first two games of the season, and totaled four rebounds and four assists during that span.
“I hadn’t had any reps with any of the guys,” he said. “I’ve really just been picturing myself in the games with them, and obviously doing what I did [tonight].”
So when Watford made his Sixers debut during last Wednesday’s overtime victory at the Washington Wizards, it was his first time running pick-and-roll actions as the ballhandler with former MVP Joel Embiid. On Sunday night, Watford said it was important to drill dribble-handoffs with Maxey, his longtime friend but first-time teammate. He is still tending to the hamstring, sitting in post-practice ice baths, using a Theragun massager during his pregame routine, and getting on the exercise bike before his first stint Sunday.
“He’s got a little ways to go,” Nurse said. “I think he’s still working his way into his wind and conditioning and stuff.”
Some of Watford’s teammates will soon face a similar task. Jared McCain, who has not played since December, went through another pregame shooting session with a brace on his surgically repaired thumb. Paul George, who also has not made his 2025-26 debut because of offseason knee surgery, played three-on-three Saturday, Nurse said. And Dominick Barlow, an early frontcourt surprise, remains out with an unfortunately located elbow laceration, which Nurse said requires a brace-like mechanism that prevents his arm from bending at the wound.
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Following Sunday’s game, Watford respectfully asked to move past questions about his hamstring. The request made sense, given that he finally got to flash the stat-stuffing versatility that the Sixers envisioned he could bring to this roster.
“That was T. Wat tonight,” he said. “That was T. Wat, for sure.”
