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The Philadelphia Sixers were facing a do-or-die Game 6 at home against their Eastern Conference semifinal foe, the Toronto Raptors. After getting eviscerated in Game 5, the Sixers needed a strong performance at home to take care of business. With help from Joel Embiid, they got it.
The Sixers got the game they needed from all of their starters, and the Raptors were not able to pull off the road victory to close this out in six games. The Sixers rolled to a double-digit victory, 112-101, on the back of sterling performances from Ben Simmons and Jimmy Butler.
The team’s most notable player, center Joel Embiid, has struggled with injury and illness for the entirety of his playoff run so far in 2019, and he started slowly in this game before coming alive in the second half.
In the middle of the fourth quarter, Joel Embiid was tussling with Marc Gasol of the Toronto Raptors in a rebounding scrum after a free throw. Gasol tumbled to the floor, pretending as if he had just been decapitated, but after review, Embiid did hit Gasol in the face (unintentionally). Embiid was hit with a flagrant 1 foul per Derek Bodner of The Athletic:
Flagrant 1 on Joel Embiid. He will get an automatic 1 game suspension if he accumulates another flagrant over the course of the playoffs.
— Derek Bodner (@DerekBodnerNBA) May 10, 2019
As you can see, the next flagrant he gets will lead to an automatic suspension in his next game. If he gets a flagrant 2, he’ll be suspended 2 games:
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Key additional point: If his next flagrant is a flagrant 2, he'll get a 2 game suspension. https://t.co/bRr9tscWpt
— Derek Bodner (@DerekBodnerNBA) May 10, 2019
Of course, the most recent flagrant on Gasol was very dubious, to put it mildly. It should be clear that this one should be rescinded. Embiid was simply boxing out Gasol, and the cagey veteran sold the call extraordinarily well in a tremendous feat of flopping.
Nevertheless, one must wait for an official rescinding of the flagrant on Friday. The Sixers should be confident about this decision, but few things in life are absolutely guaranteed.
One guarantee is that Game 7 will be played Sunday in Toronto.
