Some thoughts and observations left over from the 76ers’ most recent game, a 127-106 loss to the Atlanta Hawks on Wednesday at Philips Arena:

Looking back on the Sixers’ now-completed three-game, five-day road trip, one of the biggest impressions left was the continued offensive resurgence of Jahlil Okafor. This time last Thursday, he had been averaging 10.5 points over his previous four contests, having hit 16 of 51 field goal tries during that stretch. In his five outings that have followed, Okafor has generated 21.6 points per game, and connected on 49.4 percent of his shots. Against the Hawks, he came within a point of producing his fifth consecutive 20-point performance. Okafor wasn’t the Sixers’ only rookie big man who stood out on the team’s trek. Richaun Holmes, the seventh selection of the second round in the 2015 NBA Draft, powered his way to one of the top performances of his young career in Atlanta. He posted 12 points, his second-highest total of the year, while grabbing a personal-best seven rebounds. He also, of course, slammed home a beastly first quarter dunk on Hawks’ All-Star Al Horford. The play has made the rounds and loops on Vine and Twitter, and was also featured as the number one play on the Thursday morning edition of ESPN’s SportsCenter “Top 10” countdown. “I thought Richaun has shown tremendous improvement and toughness,” said Brett Brown. On Monday, when the Sixers were in Okafor and Holmes’ hometown of Chicago, Brown labeled Holmes a possible “real keeper.” In his eight appearances this month, Holmes is averaging 7.3 points per game, two points more than his average from November. He’s playing one less minute per game in December as well.



A right hamstring strain forced the Bowling Green product to sit out nine games in November.



As strong as Jahlil Okafor’s scoring has been the past week, he likely wouldn’t have been able to put up the numbers he did without consistent free throw shooting. After sinking five of six attempts from the stripe in Atlanta, Okafor has now hit 22 of 24 foul shots over his last five appearances, a period that began with him going a perfect eight for eight from the line in Brooklyn on December 10th. Stepping back a bit farther to examine Okafor’s overall free throw progress this season, the rookie made 59.0 percent of his attempts over his first nine contests. That figure was greatly impacted by Okafor converting a combined 8 of 18 foul shots in consecutive games on November 7th and 9th against Chicago and Orlando, respectively. In the 16 games he’s played since then, Okafor’s knocked down 81.3 percent of his tries (52-64). During the Utah Jazz and Las Vegas Samsung Summer Leagues, Okafor shot 40.6 percent on free throws (13-32). He was a 51.0 percent free throw-shooter in his lone collegiate season at Duke.