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The Portland Trail Blazers managed to escape with a 118-114 victory over the Philadelphia 76ers on Thursday night. Portland was able to stave off Philadelphia despite another monster outing from Sixers superstar Joel Embiid. Following the game, Blazers superstar Damian Lillard revealed that changing up where the doubled Embiid in the fourth quarter helped slow the big man down and secure the four-point win.
Via Casey Holdahl of Blazers.com:
One of the things @Dame_Lillard credited for the win was changing up their defense on Embiid in the fourth quarter. They were doubling at the nail, switched to the baseline in the fourth.
— Casey Holdahl (@CHold) February 12, 2021
Embiid certainly had his way throughout the night, dropping a game-high 35 points on 13-of-25 shooting. He had 29 through the first three quarters of play and looked every bit like the MVP candidate who has stormed out of the gates strong for the Sixers. However, the Cameroonian was limited to six points and two made field goals in the final frame, a testament to Portland's late-game adjustment.
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Despite trailing by four heading into the fourth, the Blazers took control in the fourth thanks to the hot hand of veteran forward Carmelo Anthony. The future Hall of Famer went vintage on the Sixers and dropped 17 of his 24 points in the fourth quarter.
Philadelphia stormed back and managed to knot the game at 114-all with 22.1 seconds left in the game. Melo then drained a couple of clutch freebies after a costly foul by Tobias Harris.
With 3.1 seconds remaining, the Sixers still had one more shot at either sending the game into overtime or sneaking by Portland with the win. Unfortunately for Philly, an errant inbound pass made its way back to the Blazers as Damian Lillard, who top-scored for the Blazers with 30 points, iced the game at the foul line.
This was Portland's second win over the Sixers in a week despite being without CJ McCollum and Jusuf Nurkic. The Blazers are staying afloat at 14-10.
