Joel Embiid scored 34 points and grabbed 12 rebounds to propel the Philadelphia 76ers to a 109-100 victory over Boston that eliminated the Celtics from the NBA playoffs.
Tyrese Maxey scored 10 of his 30 points in a frantic fourth quarter as the seventh-seeded Sixers held off the second-seeded Celtics, completing their comeback from 3-1 down in the series to book an Eastern Conference semi-final showdown with the New York Knicks.
The series was the 23rd playoff clash between the two teams and Boston had won the last six, knocking Embiid out of the playoffs in 2018, 2020 and 2023.
Embiid had said he was tired of losing to the Celtics, and he and Maxey made sure it didn’t happen again.
“We had a talk after Game Five and just said, ‘Hey, man, we can’t let the same stuff happen over and over and over again. At some point we’ve got to put a stop to it’.” Maxey said. “And we did.”
Boston star Jayson Tatum was ruled out less than two hours before tip-off with a sore left knee, but the Celtics made a game of it with Jaylen Brown finishing with 34 points and nine rebounds and Derrick White adding 26 points.
But Boston connected on just 13 of 49 three-point attempts and played catch-up all game after trailing by 15 in the first quarter.
Boston cut the deficit to one point multiple times in the fourth quarter, but they couldn’t get over the hump.
Maxey scored eight straight points to push Philadelphia’s lead to 107-98.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
𝗗𝗼𝘄𝗻𝗹𝗼𝗮𝗱 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗻𝗱𝗮𝗿𝗱 𝗔𝗽𝗽 ↓
