Cam Johnson’s 37-point outburst not enough as Nets fall to Sixers

PHILADELPHIA — Cam Johnson‘s sizzling start to the 2024-25 season continued on Friday at Wells Fargo Center, as the forward finished with a game-high 37 points in the Nets’ 113-98 loss to the Philadelphia 76ers.
Brooklyn came up short on the road, but Johnson carried it on offense from start to finish, which is not said often. The 28-year-old is having a career year through his first 16 games of this season and could be entering his offensive prime.
“I’ve been saying this a lot but, when you play with people like Ben [Simmons] and [Dennis] Schroder that are able to find you, it helps a lot just knowing that those looks are coming,” Johnson said. “I tell you guys this all the time, you guys ask me when I miss, when I make them, it’s how it goes. There’ll be days I make them, there’ll be days I miss them. I’ll just keep shooting them.
“I was just able to get a couple to go down [tonight], but I’d feel a lot better if we won, you know?”
Johnson set a new career high with nine 3-pointers made and finished one point shy of matching his career high in scoring. Sixteen of his points came in the first half. He has now scored at least 30 points in his last two appearances. He did that three times in the first 297 games of his career.
“He’s playing with a lot of confidence,” head coach Jordi Fernandez said. “He’s creating a lot of attention. And he’s also a guy that if he sees too many people on him, then he’ll kick it, and then he’ll drive it. It’s not like just he’s going to shoot it. So again, his game, it’s been very clean… We want to keep seeing that from [CJ].”
If Johnson got a little more scoring help on Friday, perhaps the Nets would not have fallen to 6-10 and 1-2 in the NBA Cup East Group A standings. Record wise, the 76ers were one of the worst teams in the Eastern Conference entering Friday’s matchup and played without two of their brightest stars.
Cam Thomas had a solid offensive night on paper, finishing with 18 points on 6-of-15 shooting, but he was limited to just four points in the first quarter and went scoreless in the fourth quarter. In addition to the lower back injury that forced him to miss Tuesday’s game against Charlotte, Thomas told reporters after the game that he was also feeling under the weather.
Nic Claxton, who returned from a three-game absence, chipped in 12 points on an efficient 6-of-9 shooting off the bench. But the Nets were lacking firepower outside of those three, and Johnson was the only player who could score the ball consistently through four quarters. Joel Embiid and Paul George did not suit up for the 76ers on Friday.
Brooklyn had three players finish in double figures, led by Johnson. Philadelphia had six, paced by rookie Jared McCain (30 points) and All-Star Tyrese Maxey (26 points).
The Nets led 90-89 with 7:25 remaining but were outscored 24-8 the rest of the way. They were outscored 34-21 in the fourth quarter in total. Their defense had no answers for McCain (14 points) and Maxey (nine points) down the stretch.
“We have some good teams coming up with good backcourts,” Nic Claxton said. “If we don’t lock in, we’re going to get beat by more than what we did tonight.”
Brooklyn committed 19 turnovers, which created 28 points for Philadelphia. The backcourt pairing of Thomas and Dennis Schröder combined for 14 if those giveaways.
“We just have to be better, clean it up, take care of the ball,” Thomas said.