The Philadelphia 76ers have undergone an unfortunate series of events in recent days and things got even worse on Saturday. With the Sixers having a handful of players sidelined with injuries and COVID-19 protocols, Doc Rivers reacted to the whirlwind of events that have taken place ahead of Philadelphia's matchup with the Denver Nuggets, per ESPN's Tim Bontemps.
Doc Rivers: "The last 36 hours have been nuts, as you would expect."
— Tim Bontemps (@TimBontemps) January 9, 2021
It all began with Seth Curry testing positive for COVID-19 earlier this week, causing him to be quarantined away from the team. Then, on Saturday, it was discovered that Shake Milton and Tobias Harris were among players that would be out on Saturday due to the league's COVID-19 guidelines.
In addition, both Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons have been ruled out versus the Nuggets due to injuries. Provided that, the 76ers are set to have only eight players — seven players in their rotation due to Mike Scott being limited with injury — which is the exact number of players the NBA requires a team to have to conduct a game.
When speaking about the crazy turn of events, Rivers joked that he would start Dwight Howard at point guard.
Doc Rivers: "An hour ago we were told we were playing. We have eight active players. One is Mike Scott, and I can tell you right now there's no way I'm going to play him."
Said 76ers essentially have seven players.
"Dwight Howard's going to play point guard …"
— Mike Singer (@msinger) January 9, 2021
While the Sixers have one of the worst COVID-19 situations we've seen early in the season, Rivers is concerned with how it's going to affect his team on the floor.
Doc Rivers: "COVID wise, I'm 59 years old … I trust the league, as far as health-wise. But I'm more concerned on the floor. We're going to play players who haven't played a lot of minutes. … That's not just today. That's an accumulation of minutes."
— Tim Bontemps (@TimBontemps) January 9, 2021
Even though Philadelphia is going to be shorthanded, Rivers also comedically said that he is going to ask Mike Malone to sit a handful of his players to level the playing field.
Doc Rivers jokingly asks the media to pass along a message to Mike Malone that if he could "sit seven or eight guys" that would be great.
— Tim Bontemps (@TimBontemps) January 9, 2021
It remains to be seen how many players the Sixers are going to miss for an extended period of time due to quarantine. But ahead of their showdown with Denver on Saturday, it's apparent that Rivers is going to have his work cut out for him with an extremely shorthanded roster.
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