The Philadelphia 76ers forced a Game 7 in their first-round NBA playoff series versus the Boston Celtics with a 106-93 win on Thursday night at Xfinity Mobile Arena. That decisive game will be played Saturday night in Boston.
Tyrese Maxey scored 27 points to lead all scorers, 21 of those in the first half, with five assists and two steals. George finished with 23 points, scoring 10 points in the third quarter. On a night when the Sixers relied on the 3-pointer, George shot 5-for-8 from behind the arc while Maxey went 3-for-5.
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Philadelphia also nearly got a triple-double from Joel Embiid, who notched 19 points, nine rebounds and eight assists. VJ Edgecombe and Kelly Oubre Jr. each added 14 points and combined to grab 18 rebounds.
A third-quarter surge put the Sixers in control of the game, outscoring Boston 24-14 for an 82-63 lead. Philly was nearly up by more, but Andre Drummond’s 3-pointer at the buzzer was ruled to be after the clock ran out.
Philadelphia came out aggressive to begin the second half, expanding its lead to 15 points on back-to-back dunks by Edgecombe and Oubre. Coming out of a timeout, Derrick White hit a 3 to temporarily slow the Sixers down. But an Oubre jumper and 3 from George pushed the lead up to 74-57 at the 7:27 mark of the third quarter.
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The Celtics also played the fourth quarter without Jayson Tatum, who left the game with left calf discomfort. He came back to the Boston bench, but with an ice pack on that calf. (Tatum tore his right Achilles tendon in last year’s Eastern Conference Finals.) Facing a large deficit, there was little sense in the Celtics pushing Tatum, who finished with 17 points and 11 rebounds.
Neither team shot well to begin the game, though the Philadelphia crowd was ready to erupt. The Sixers’ plan appeared to be working the ball inside to Joel Embiid against Neemias Queta, but he quickly settled for 3-point tries rather than take the ball to the basket.
Yet after taking an 11-4 lead, Philadelphia missed two 3-pointers and couldn’t expand the margin. That gave the Celtics an opportunity to go on top with a Jayson Tatum 3 and Payton Pritchard jumper. Boston scored the final seven points of the quarter, capped by a Sam Hauser 3-pointer, to take a 23-20 lead.
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The two teams traded leads six times by the midway point of the second quarter before the 76ers built a six-point margin on a midrange shot by VJ Edgecombe and two free throws from Tyrese Maxey. Jaylen Brown then committed his third foul of the half pushing Oubre off of him, which sent him to the bench.
George hit a 3 to give the Sixers’ a nine-point lead, which they maintained until Maxey expanded that with another 3 to go ahead 56-44. He scored once more before halftime, giving him 13 points in the quarter and 21 for the first half as Philadelphia went into the locker room up 58-49.
Philadelphia came out aggressive to begin the second half, expanding its lead to 15 points on back-to-back dunks by Edgecome and Oubre. Coming out of a timeout, Derrick White hit a 3 to temporarily slow the Sixers down. But an Oubre jumper and George 3-pointer pushed the lead up to 74-57 at the 7:27 mark of the third quarter.
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