Sixers beat Magic to set up dramatic standings battle on final day of the season

Joel Embiid and Tyrese Maxey combined for 60 points in a 125-113 Sixers win over the Orlando Magic, keeping their chances of escaping the play-in tournament alive heading into the season finale.

Here’s what I saw.

The Good

— With Joel Embiid returning to the lineup so late in the season, it was fair to wonder how quickly he’d be able to get up to speed before the playoffs. By all accounts, he worked hard in the rehab and recovery process, it’s just that game lungs and game sharpness can’t be simulated on the practice floor. In something close to a playoff game vs. Orlando, Embiid looked how you’d hope a franchise player would in mid-April, picking the Magic apart.

There were a couple of sloppy turnovers, if you want to focus on the negative, but Embiid has put together some of the best passing highlights of his life since returning from injury. Poor Wendell Carter Jr. had no chance against Embiid in single-coverage, as proven by his early foul trouble, and when the Magic tried to send extra help to stop Embiid, the big man put some serious mustard on his passes. Take a look at this frozen rope to Kelly Oubre, who finished the job with a made three from the corner:

Embiid has been looking to pass constantly since his return, and in truth, he was spraying passes all over the floor to open this season before he transformed back into the unstoppable scoring monster we’ve seen year after year. Building a championship-level offense around Embiid was always going to require playmaking growth from him, and he has shown it, though Nick Nurse’s schematic tweaks and emphasis on movement/cutting have helped him take his game to another level.

Other than the scare before halftime, this was a masterpiece for Embiid. His efficiency was slightly below par, but he rebounded well, got his 30-ball, and used the attention he drew to create a stream of open threes for the boys.

— It says a lot about how special Embiid is that Tyrese Maxey can be dwarfed by one of his teammates for long stretches of games. He has become such an easy player to build around on offense as a result of the strides he has taken since leaving Kentucky, growing into a player who is as dangerous without the ball as he is with it.

Now that Embiid is back to serve as Maxey’s running mate, we’ve seen No. 0 unleashed. Maxey gave the Magic fits trying to keep up with him. When they made the mistake of switching a big onto him or sagging off of him, he was ready to punish the lack of foot speed across from him, stepping into easy pull-up threes. With Kyle Lowry (or Kelly Oubre, or Tobias Harris) on the ball and initiating the offense with Embiid as a ball-screener, Maxey was the danger man on either wing, lurking for a catch-and-shoot three if the Magic fell asleep for even a split second. Since Embiid was in jumbo playmaker mode for the entire first half, Maxey got to focus on his best skill, which is to say he was putting the ball in the damn basket.

On the other end of the floor, Maxey still has his issues with screen navigation and off-ball rotations, but the “want to” has been more apparent for months. With former Sixers guard Markelle Fultz about to waltz in for a transition basket in the first half, Maxey used his speed to get back in the picture and stonewall Fultz mid-leap:

Coming down the stretch, the Sixers appeared to be out of ideas and out of haymakers from Joel Embiid. One of the reasons to hope they can go deeper in the playoffs this season is the growth of Maxey as a closer in the fourth quarter — with Orlando breathing down their necks, Maxey put on a scoring clinic with a runner, a stepback three, a midrange jumper, and an and-one layup through contact, providing the last bit of separation they needed to see out the victory.

Is he “the closer” ahead of Embiid? Maybe not in the pecking order. But he’s got the composure and the talent to take over when it counts, and most importantly, he has the faith of Embiid and Nick Nurse.

— Kyle Lowry feels like he was built in a lab to play alongside Joel Embiid. Maybe that’s because Lowry can play with just about anybody, but the franchise’s past attempts to acquire him make a lot more sense now that you can see them working together on the floor.

Playing alongside Maxey in the backcourt, the limitations imposed by Lowry’s age are not as noticeable. With a younger, quicker creator to take responsibility out of his hands, Lowry can use his bursts of energy to attack advantage situations, crushing teams in four-on-threes and finding the open man on seemingly every transition opportunity. The hit-ahead passes are one of the few similarities he has with James Harden, and though Tobias Harris did not take advantage of all of them, Lowry connected with No. 12 on several beautiful feeds against Orlando.

Lowry has been a “beyond the box score” guy his whole career, the ultimate player for middle-aged dads, and that hasn’t changed much as he moves deep into his 30s. I may not be at that stage of life yet, but I certainly appreciate a guard who can set a screen, relocate to improve spacing, and beat much quicker players to spots on defense.

— Kelly Oubre deserves every bit of praise he has gotten for the last month or so of play, and if they get anything close to that guy when the playoffs begin, they are going to be a tough out no matter who they’re up against.

Orlando is young, long, and athletic, built in a way that can dwarf guys who can’t hang with them around the rim on either end of the floor. But Oubre is not going to back down from anybody. When his rim attacks and runners fell short of a bucket, he was the first guy off of the floor for a potential second-chance opportunity. The three-ball was more miss than hit, but he hit a couple of momentum-swinging shots throughout the night, enough to keep Orlando honest and in fear of the next shot that went up.

And yes, as I have said approximately 30 times lately, he’s looking to pass and bought in on defense. Can’t ask for much more.

The Bad

— Transition defense hasn’t been as dire for the Sixers as it was in some recent seasons, but when teams are as committed to running as the Magic were in this game, you can see the old cracks begin to show. Orlando has to make up for half-court offensive issues by pressing the issue in transition, and I’d argue that was the biggest factor in the Magic keeping the game close in the second half.

With a real guard at the point of attack, I think Orlando will be a gigantic pain in the ass for Eastern Conference teams in the years to come. Franz Wagner is a dangerous do-it-all forward and Paolo Banchero is a matchup nightmare for most teams at forward, they’re just in need of some more juice in the halfcourt.

— While we’re on the subject of Banchero, Tobias Harris (and the help behind Harris) did a pretty good job of slowing down the younger forward. But boy, did Banchero hand him his ass down the stretch of this game. Drove by him, shot over him, and denied him at the rim on the other end of the floor. Tough scene.

— If Buddy Hield is turning the ball over on dumb passes in the backcourt, his rotation spot is going to be even smaller in the playoffs than it is right now. At least he hit a couple of threes!

— Why has this team struggled so much with inbounds passes over the last couple of weeks? They have at least three five-second violations I can remember during that period, and when the Payne/Hield backcourt is on the floor, I question whether the Sixers will ever be able to advance the ball past halfcourt.

It shouldn’t be this difficult, fellas.

The Ugly

— It was all going too well, wasn’t it? Joel Embiid was sharing the ball, Tyrese Maxey was hitting pull-up threes, Kelly Oubre was serving as a competent third scorer, and the Sixers looked like a team with a coherent identity. The inevitable trapdoor was waiting for all of us, we just didn’t want to admit it.

The play was innocuous enough. Joel Embiid attacked Jonathan Isaac on a dribble drive, hitting a Euro step before finishing for two relatively pedestrian points. But as he started making his way back down the floor, it became clear that something was up, and Embiid could only saunter to around halfcourt before gesturing toward Tyrese Maxey that he wasn’t going to make it back. The Sixers got scored on, began to go into their next possession, and were forced to call timeout as Embiid just walked (limped, really) around the floor until he could hit the locker room.

Here’s the good news — Embiid took the floor in the second half and shook off whatever pained him in that moment. But it was a quick reminder of how quickly things could go right back to hell. If the previous two months did not drive this point home enough, the difference between playing with and without Embiid is astronomical. They have been one of the league’s best teams with the reigning MVP in the lineup, and near-hopeless without him. He ties everything together, carries them in scoring, boosts their defensive floor and ceiling, and provides a spiritual lift that is hard to account for even aside from all of that. No more scares, please.