PHILADELPHIA — Less than a week ago, the Philadelphia 76ers looked like a defeated basketball team.
They had just come off a horrible road loss to the New Orleans Pelicans. That came on the heels of a terrible home loss to the Atlanta Hawks, to start the post-All-Star-break schedule. And those two losses came on the heels of bad blowout defeats to the Portland Trail Blazers and the New York Knicks, right before the break.
The Sixers looked tired. They were without superstar center Joel Embiid. They were without small forward Paul George. They had no legs. The resilience they’d played with most of this season appeared to be waning.
“We really needed a win,” star point guard Tyrese Maxey said.
Fast forward five days. When Embiid hit the dagger 3-pointer to seal a 124-117 win over the Miami Heat, the team’s third straight victory, an animated crowd at Xfinity Mobile Arena exploded. The Sixers players amped up the home-court fans who’d watched the team go just 15-15 at home before Thursday.
“We knew that at some point, we needed to come up with some marquee wins at home,” is how Maxey put it.
The NBA’s 82-game schedule produces sudden change. One bad week, and your season can look done. One good week, and you can look like a title contender. Most teams are likely to touch both extremes. But even under that pretense, Philadelphia’s turnaround to win three straight games over the last five days is impressive.
So how did it happen? It began with a talk from Maxey, and a challenge from him to his guys. He told them the season could go one of two ways. They could keep feeling sorry for themselves, and they could slide into the Play-In Tournament. Or, they could figure it out, and go and be the team they’ve talked about being for much of this season.
The Sixers chose to fight.
That’s why Sunday night’s road win over the Minnesota Timberwolves qualified as one of the best wins of the year. It was certainly one of the most important. The Sixers would have dropped into seventh in the East and into a Play-In spot with a loss. It was the second night of a back-to-back for the 76ers. It was also their third game in four nights. They were without Embiid and George. They had no business having life in their legs. It looked like a schedule loss in every sense of the term.
Instead, the 76ers played with as much gusto and energy as they have all season, and that allowed them to cruise to a 135-108 win. Embiid came back on Tuesday against the Indiana Pacers, and the Sixers took care of business with a 135-1134 victory. And that spilled over into Thursday night’s win over the Heat.
“I think it’s big, because you need to beat the teams around you and hold as many tie-breakers as you can,” Sixers coach Nick Nurse said. “We also have to start getting some wins in our building. So it was a big win from that standpoint as well.”
Beating Miami allowed Philadelphia to tie the season series between the two teams at 1-1, with the rubber match in Miami on March 30. And at this point, owning the tie-breaker over the Heat looks to be significant. The two teams are now just 2 1/2 games apart in the standings. Thursday’s win also allows the 76ers (33-26) to go into a tough stretch with some momentum. They travel to Boston to face the Celtics on Sunday. They see the San Antonio Spurs, who may currently be the best team in the NBA, on Tuesday.
On the night he passed Allen Iverson to become the franchise leader in career 3-point makes, Maxey was electric, getting into the lane whenever he wanted and setting up terrific shots for himself and his teammates. He scored 20 of his 28 points in the first quarter. The presence of him and Embiid allowed Philadelphia to take a good shot offensively almost every time down the floor.
That’s why there has been such a wild difference in the Sixers’ offense. Embiid has gotten back to such a high level as a player that it’s difficult to compensate for his absence. He takes up so much attention from opposing defenses that the rest of Philadelphia’s players are finding space that’s not there when Embiid is sidelined. And when Maxey sees more space, he’s either going to score or miss a very good shot at the basket.
Beyond those two, the Sixers have been defending better over the last three games. They’ve come up with critical stops. And they’ve been able to string together big sequences when needed.
On Thursday, the Sixers forged a big lead early, gave it back in the third quarter and saw the matchup morph into a close game. But they scored the final eight points to pull away. They turned the game into a metaphor of their season. They found their backs against the proverbial wall, and they responded.
That’s why, if the season were to end today, Philadelphia would be guaranteed a playoff berth.