Embiid leads Sixers past Celtics, forces decisive Game 7 in Boston

Philadelphia turned a season that looked finished into a decisive Game 7 by finding, at last, its sharpest version. Joel Embiid returned from an appendectomy and scored 33 points in Game 5, Tyrese Maxey added 25 points and 10 rebounds, and the 76ers beat Boston 113-97 to avoid elimination and reset a series the Celtics had seemed to seize.

The shift mattered because it was not just a bounce-back score line. Boston had just taken Game 4 in Philadelphia, 128-96, behind Payton Pritchard’s 32 points and Jayson Tatum’s 30 points and 11 assists to build a 3-1 series lead. Instead of folding, Philadelphia answered with back-to-back survival wins, then carried that momentum into a 106-93 Game 6 victory at home to force Saturday’s winner-take-all game in Boston.

What changed for Philadelphia was the series’ center of gravity. Embiid’s presence gave the Sixers a matchup Boston had to solve again, and Maxey’s production kept the offense from becoming one-dimensional. After missing the end of the regular season and the start of the playoffs, Embiid returned only 17 days after surgery and immediately gave Philadelphia a scoring anchor it had lacked. The result was a far more controlled and complete performance than the one Boston had dictated in Game 4.

That control now sets up the hardest test of all: proving the adjustment can travel. The Sixers have already shown they can disrupt Boston’s rhythm for consecutive games, but TD Garden offers a different stage, and the Celtics have already shown how overwhelming they can be when the matchup tilts their way. The winner advances to face the New York Knicks in the second round, raising the stakes beyond a single game in a rivalry that has repeatedly carried the weight of a conference season.

This is one of the NBA’s defining playoff series for a reason. The teams met in a dramatic Game 7 in the 2023 Eastern Conference semifinals, when Boston won 112-88 behind Tatum’s Game 7-record 51 points. Boston then entered the 2024 playoffs as the East’s top seed and went on to win the championship, its first since 2008 and 18th overall. Philadelphia has now forced another decision point, and this time the equation in Boston looks far less settled than it did a few days ago.