Embiid shares his side of kick on Claxton, yet another strange playoff night originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia
NEW YORK — Though Thursday’s Game 3 matchup between the Sixers and Nets was extreme in its animosity-infused drama, the night was in no way unprecedented.
After the Sixers scrapped past Brooklyn to take a 3-0 lead in their first-round playoff series, head coach Doc Rivers provided that perspective when asked whether he’d ever been part of a similar game.
“Uh, yeah. I played for the Knicks,” he said. “Go watch Phoenix-Knicks.”
Rivers joked that “70 people” were ejected on the 1993 night in Phoenix that he strongly objected to Kevin Johnson’s blindside shoulder. In Game 3 at Barclays Center, a mere two players — James Harden and Nic Claxton — were tossed.
Controversially, Joel Embiid was not one of them. For kicking out at Claxton in the first quarter after the Nets center stood over him, Embiid only received a Flagrant 1 foul.
“The contact was deemed unnecessary,” crew chief Tony Brothers told pool reporter Brian Mahoney of The Associated Press, “and based on the point of contact to the leg, it didn’t rise to the level of excessive.”
As the officials examined the play, Rivers was not compelled to do the same.
“I never looked up. I swear to God, I didn’t want to look up,” he said. “To this point, I’ve yet to see it. The game was not going well. I’m not superstitious, but I swear to God, I never looked up. I haven’t seen it yet. I thought, the way this thing is going, anything can happen.”
Embiid’s recollection of the play was more dubious than his coach’s.
“I don’t know. I don’t remember,” he said with a sly smile. “We’re up 3-0. We move on. It takes me a lot to process a game after that type of fight, so I’ve got to go watch the tape, see what we can do better, what I can do better. I’m just happy we got the win.”
Did Embiid remember Claxton’s ejection early in the fourth quarter for being assessed a second technical foul?
“Um … yes,” he said with a laugh.
“The whole game, you could see what they were doing — just trying to get a rise out of me. Especially after the first one, I just understood I’m too valuable to get into this stuff. … Hitting me in the back, that’s not reviewed. My back, my knee, hitting me every single time, which is fine. It’s working for them, but just got to keep going.
“You could see what the game plan was: Got to hit them. Got to make me frustrated so I could get ejected. I’m too mature to put myself in the position where I’m going to get ejected. So I’m glad I just went about my business and we got the win.”
The Sixers have shown this season that they’re capable of winning in many ways; they were even 11-5 in the regular-season games Embiid missed. But a playoff victory in which the NBA’s back-to-back scoring champion scores 14 points on 5-for-13 shooting and Harden gets rather perplexingly ejected obviously does not follow any kind of pre-established blueprint.
Strangeness has been central to Embiid’s career, though. Ahead of Sixers-Nets Game 3 in the 2019 playoffs, Boban Marjanovic’s pregame yoga routine made the visiting locker room feel tiny and Embiid talked about the left knee injury that hampered him throughout the second half of that season.
He sat that night and Greg Monroe started. Marjanovic scored 14 points off the bench. Ben Simmons had 31 points, Tobias Harris 29 and JJ Redick 26 in the Sixers’ victory. Embiid suited up for Game 4 and was tremendous in a win that featured Jared Dudley and Jimmy Butler’s ejections and Mike Scott’s clutch three-pointer.
On Thursday, there were again clear reasons for concern with Embiid’s health. He appeared to shake off head athletic trainer Kevin Johnson after grabbing at his right knee and limping to the sidelines for a timeout in the third quarter.
“I’m OK,” Embiid said. “Took a lot of shots today, but I’m fine.”
However he truly felt, Embiid had enough in his legs to deliver a giant block in the final seconds on Spencer Dinwiddie’s game-tying layup try.
“Coming down, I was tracking him the whole time,” Embiid said. “I knew he was going to do … not something stupid, but I knew he was going to try to be aggressive in that situation. I was tracking him down the whole time and as soon as I saw him drive, I just figured he was kind of past his man and he had a layup.
“The whole playoffs, I think I’ve been pretty good defensively, but usually, in the fourth quarters, I even take it to another level. I just saw it and decided to attack it. I got lucky and got the block.”
Whatever stories Embiid chooses to tell about Thursday night, the Sixers have a 3-0 advantage and a chance to sweep the Nets on Saturday afternoon.
And when Embiid is Rivers’ age, perhaps he’ll have different memories about April 20, 2023.