PHILADELPHIA – For the first time in 713 days, postseason basketball returned to South Philadelphia. Unlike that night – the Sixers had a crushing, season-ending loss at the hands of the New York Knicks – the buzzer sounded on Wednesday night with the Sixers victorious.

The Sixers will face the Boston Celtics in the first round of the NBA Playoffs. For the second time in three years, they entered the Play-In Tournament as the Eastern Conference's No. 7 seed and earned the right to keep that spot with a win. They beat the Orlando Magic, 109-97, in a game that was predictably chaotic, physical and intense.

They did it, of course, without Joel Embiid, who remains sidelined after being diagnosed with appendicitis last week. Tyrese Maxey, Paul George, Kelly Oubre Jr. and Andre Drummond were the leaders all night long, with rookie VJ Edgecombe making a handful of standout plays in his first taste of NBA postseason action. Predictably, the game featured a lot of extracurriculars and even more nerves, but a Maxey resurgence down the stretch in tandem with critical plays on both ends from his entire supporting cast helped the Sixers put the game away.

Takeaways from the most important Sixers victory in nearly two years:

Sixers handle their business down the stretch.

An Orlando push late in the third quarter kept the Magic within arm's reach, and the entire arena tensed up as the final frame began with the game hanging in the balance. George gave the Sixers a seven-point lead with a tough jumper over a good contest to momentarily settle things down, but Orlando predictably responded with another haymaker. Desmond Bane, the star of the show for the Magic all night, continued his heater, while Franz Wagner finally announced his presence. That seven-point lead quickly went down to two, with the Sixers sputtering offensively as the ball began to stick.

After a much-needed timeout, Edgecombe knocked down a mid-range jumper – he has stopped so many opponent runs this season – but Anthony Black responded with a triple. Then it became all about Maxey. After he fell to the ground converting a driving layup, Edgecombe had to switch onto the much larger Paolo Banchero in an emergency. Edgecombe made a tremendous hands play to force a turnover, which Maxey paid off by cashing a triple. The Sixers got a pair of stops and Maxey gave them an eight-point lead by penetrating and scoring on a floater. As Orlando called timeout, Maxey – who appeared fatigued and frustrated for much of the game while he nurses a significant finger injury – let out a whole lot of emotion.

Out of the timeout, Oubre connected on his fifth triple of the game to respond to an Orlando basket, but Banchero converted an and-one and Wendell Carter Jr. drew a foul inside. The lead was down to four points with as many minutes left, and after Maxey scored again to add some breathing room, a few poorly-timed miscues on the defensive glass – where the Sixers were mostly stout – allowed Wagner to score.

Leading by five points inside of the three-minute mark, the Sixers nearly experienced a shot-clock violation, but Drummond found Edgecombe for an incredibly challenging finish inside. The rookie flexed, and then after blocking Banchero on the other end of the floor, so did Drummond. The Sixers then gave away two points with a defensive breakdown, but Edgecombe – who did more than his part on Wednesday – drove to the rim with incredible speed, drew a foul and calmly knocked down two shots at the line.

Then came the dagger sequence: a Maxey block, an incredibly physical drive from Oubre, yet another Banchero miss and, of all things, Drummond's second corner three of the game:

The Sixers were up by 12 points with 40 seconds left, and a desolate Orlando team was probably out of the game earlier than that.

Paul George plays quarterback

Of the 15 players on the Sixers' standard roster, only seven have appeared in the NBA Playoffs before. Technically, this was not a playoff game, but it did have a playoff atmosphere, playoff intensity and playoff implications. Not everyone Sixers head coach Nick Nurse trotted out was a postseason rookie – six of the seven players with playoff experience were in his eight-man rotation – but there is a decent bit of inexperience within this group.

Enter soon-to-be 36-year-old George, whose playoff track record may be dubious in the eyes of some but he has been playing in high-pressure games for well over a decade now. George's communication tactics have been praised by his coaches and teammates all season long, and it was evident early just how significant his reach as an organizer can be. George is typically the quarterback of the defense, and that was the case on Wednesday, but he also was doing a lot of work to settle everybody down offensively.

George had four early assists in addition to being absolutely everywhere on the defensive end, and he left a larger imprint on the game's beginning than his line in the box score reflected. Then came the second quarter, and George's scoring emerged. The nine-time All-Star teamed with the 20-year-old Edgecombe to handle the Maxey-less minutes, and those went well for the Sixers in the first half – they outscored Orlando by two points in four minutes and change to start the second quarter – in part because of George's calming presence.

Desmond Bane presents the most issues

Any team that plays Orlando is bound and determined to limit Banchero and Wagner, two 6-foot-10 wings capable of scoring inside, knocking down a jumper and creating a shot for someone else. They are different plays, as Nurse attested to pregame, but they present some similar challenges as jumbo-sized initiators. It is easy to hone in solely on limiting their production.

That is precisely why the Magic paid a premium to acquire Bane this summer. Bane is a renowned sharpshooter, but he is much more than a spot-up three-point marksman, even if he is among the league's elite in that category. Bane is tough, physical and strong; he can absorb and play through contact as well as any shooting guard in the NBA. And, after days of discussing Banchero and Wagner (whose minutes were limited due to an ankle issue that has plagued him for more than four months), it was Bane whose individual offense was the most powerful – literally and figuratively.

George did a solid job defending Banchero, and Oubre was able to limit Wagner for much of the night. But Bane, mostly defended by Edgecombe, utilized his strength advantage to get downhill over and over. He shot nine free throws in the first half alone, and it kept Orlando's offense afloat in addition to terrific interior scoring. That continued in the third quarter, as Bane single-handedly got the Magic out of of a rut:

Banchero, as he often does, took far too many inefficient jumpers; George and others did an excellent job stonewalling his drives and forcing him to settle. Wagner, meanwhile, could not get into the flow of the game much until the end. 

All things muscle

On paper, this matchup looked unfavorable for the Sixers when it came to rebounding. Orlando is good on both sides of the ball when it comes to the glass, while the Sixers are a decent offensive rebounding team but very poor on the other end of the floor. But early on, it was the Sixers who controlled that aspect of the game.

Adem Bona may be lean for a center, but his motor never stops running. He was able to set the tone with a few hustle plays early and quickly tagged in Andre Drummond, whose opening stint lasted 12 minutes and was excellent. Drummond scored a pair of buckets, had a nifty assist and, most importantly, was everywhere on the glass. Drummond, Bona and Quentin Grimes were all central figures in the Sixers scoring 10 second-chance points in the first quarter alone, swinging the early minutes in their favor:

Orlando was able to turn that water off a bit afterwards, but the fact that it was the Magic who had to respond to the Sixers' force on the glass – and not the other way around – was an upset.

Nurse opted to start Bona over Drummond on Wednesday; this was a bit of a surprise given the veteran's late-season surge. But Bona was always going to have a short leash, and his opening stint only lasted four minutes and change. While Carter, Orlando's starting center, is a more well-rounded player than backup Goga Bitadze, Bitadze presents a much more imposing challenge on the glass. Drummond was clearly a better fit for the Bitadze matchup. Ultimately, it became clear pretty quickly that this was a Drummond game more than it was a Bona game, and the two centers' minutes reflected that.

Bona had a stellar stint to open the second half, though, swatting two shots in emphatic fashion and doing his job to prevent Orlando from finding life on the offensive glass.

Odds and ends

Some additional notes:

• Nurse hinted on Sunday that Justin Edwards was in line for his ninth and final rotation spot. Instead, that spot went to... nobody. Nurse ran with an eight-man rotation; his starters were supported by Grimes, Drummond and Dominick Barlow. It was a rough night for Barlow, whose inability to knock down an open jumper was exploited. Barlow racked up five fouls in 10 minutes before the third quarter was over; that marked the end of his night.

• While Embiid is still without any sort of timetable as far as a return to basketball activity goes, he rejoined the team about an hour before tip-off. Embiid entered the locker room a few minutes before 6:30 p.m. and a number of teammates were surprised to see him. It certainly appeared to be the very first time Embiid has been around any of his teammates since his emergency appendectomy last week.

Up next: Game 1 of the first-round series between the Sixers and Celtics will be on Sunday afternoon in Boston.