May 02, 2026
Winslow Townson/Imagn Images
All of the focus was on Joel Embiid in Game 7 on Saturday night.
BOSTON – An hour and change before tip-off on Saturday night in Boston, the visitor's locker room hosted a calm and confident bunch. The Sixers, coming off back-to-back resounding wins over a Celtics, knew they could win the game. Soon after, their opponents proved to be panicked. Boston completely overhauled its starting five with the game on the line and Jayson Tatum shockingly out due to a knee injury.
Truthfully, no adjustment Celtics head coach Joe Mazzulla could utilize would have stopped a Sixers team that, out of thin air, has found unshakeable swagger. And from Joel Embiid's easy mid-range jumper on the first play of the game to the sound of the final horn, the Sixers did not play with hesitation, even when the inevitable Celtics pushes came. It was – yet again – a masterclass. Embiid was dominant all night, and everybody joined him.
Embiid, for the first time in his career, has beaten the Boston Celtics in the playoffs. Embiid, for the first time in his career, has led the Sixers past a great team in the playoffs. Embiid, who is three weeks and changed removed from an emergency appendectomy, led the Sixers to three wins in four games to pull off one of the biggest series upsets in recent NBA history. The Sixers avoided disaster, with their 18-point lead eventually being trimmed to one point before a resilient, defensive-oriented closing effort sealed the deal.
The Sixers are on to the New York Knicks. Takeaways from the night they finally toppled TD Garden with a 109-100 win:
Embiid, a former NBA MVP, has probably better games than the one he did on Saturday. His 70-point game, after all, is not that long ago. But, given all that has transpired over the last month – really, over the last two-plus years – this performance should be atop any list of single-game outings for Embiid.
In an arena he has never been able to get the job done around this time of year, Embiid never shied away from the moment. He did not set a poor example for his team. Instead, as he has done for three games in a row, Embiid raised everybody's level of focus and execution. He applied force against a Boston defense not equipped to handle it. He torched single coverage and made the right pass every time Boston double-teamed him. Where he leveled up from the Sixers' last two wins was on the glass. Embiid never gave up on a potential rebound and earned the Sixers several extra points with sheer will and determination. He remains vulnerable on the perimeter defensively, but pulled off one of the best blocks of his life to help keep the Sixers in front at halftime, making a huge momentum play:
block ➡️ bucket pic.twitter.com/QRT2JPT15a
— Philadelphia 76ers (@sixers) May 3, 2026
When Boston basically abandoned its struggling center rotation in the third quarter and went to five smalls, Embiid did not mess around. He simply pummeled them time and time again, forcing the Celtics to go back to weak links. In the fourth quarter, he lifted the Sixers out of a collapse that would have been par for the course.
Embiid, 32, has been the subject of tremendous scrutiny throughout his NBA career. Some players think that goes away if they become a superstar, but Embiid has learned that the microscope only gets closer. Much of the criticism Embiid has faced has been fair, particularly in recent years as the Sixers have drifted away from championship contention.
On this night, Embiid was everything his doubters have said he could never be. He led by example and refused to be denied. It should not be the case given this was a first-round series, but that was without question the most significant win of his NBA career.
A local boxer once said that is not about how hard you can hit, but how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. Perhaps it is a cliché – it is definitely a cliché – but it is a sound way to reflect upon what the Sixers accomplished on Saturday night.
The Celtics were without Tatum, and they were clearly panicked. But they are a resilient team with excellent players, and they did not stop pushing. Their home-court advantage, quite possibly the best in the NBA, loomed large over the game; the Boston crowd spent much of the night trying to will the Celtics to find their way.
One of the most challenging parts of beating the Celtics in Boston in the playoffs.
Boston's first punch was landed in the second quarter; they went on an 18-4 run which sent Celtics fans into a frenzy. Quentin Grimes, who has stepped up twice in three games, made the difference. After Payton Pritchard gave Boston its first lead with a three and Embiid missed a jumper, Grimes flew in to draw a foul and keep the possession alive. He then scored later in the play, and Edgecombe followed it up with a three. It was a massive swing sequence from Grimes to settle the Sixers down in a hostile environment.
Late in the first half, with Boston inching closer and the game hanging in the balance, the Sixers desperately needed to reassert their upper hand. Thanks to Embiid's persistence as a rebounder, the aforementioned stellar block and Maxey's mid-range jumper, the Sixers went into intermission feeling as good about their showing as they deserved to.
That momentum was a big deal in the third quarter – once the Sixers' Achilles heel – in which they got off to a terrific start to, once again, set the tone of a calm and collected crew. Embiid was at the center of it, but it was a major moment for the starting backcourt of Tyrese Maxey and VJ Edgecombe. The two pillars of the Sixers' long-term future were simply marvelous, and Embiid's heroic outing should not cloud that.
After the Sixers bled points with Embiid sitting in the second quarter, head coach Nick Nurse opted to sit him with four minutes and 47 seconds left in the first half and his team ahead. Instead of faltering, the Sixers kicked off that stretch on a 10-3 run, ultimately winning the minutes by two to give themselves a 13-point cushion entering the final frame.
In the fourth quarter, Embiid had a pair of early misses and Boston got the lead back down to single-digits. As Nurse rode his best players as much as he possibly could, Boston started to look like the far more energized team, with the fans behind them helping add juice and a Celtics zone defense flustering the Sixers.
In the blink of an eye, the Sixers had melted down. Their 18-point lead was down to one, and Embiid, just seconds after banging knees with an opponent, drilled a pick-and-pop three to settle things down. He got a one-on-one stop, too. Maxey responded to Derrick White's fifth triple of the game by getting downhill and drawing a foul, which Boston unsuccessfully challenged.
Finally, Boston ran out of gas. Jaylen Brown missed good look after good look, Maxey gave the Sixers a superstar-caliber close in the form of back-to-back driving baskets, and with Embiid laboring after an unbelievable performance to get the Sixers to the finish line, Maxey took the final step. Embiid earned the right to get that final burst from the best teammate he has ever had.
Up next: Game 1 between the Sixers and New York Knicks will be on Monday night at Madison Square Garden.
