The Philadelphia 76ers got here out beaming with delight as they delivered their first signature win of the 2024-25 season, outlasting the Boston Celtics on their Christmas Day bout, 118-114.
The victory was so essential that it led Joel Embiid to get much more optimistic and assured of the 76ers’ possibilities to compete and push by means of after a disastrous season begin.
“I feel we bought a excessive ceiling,” Embiid mentioned. “It’s all about us pulling it collectively. I don’t assume we performed our greatest basketball, however Tyrese was nice.
“I might’ve been higher. PG might’ve been higher and we will probably be higher.
“The bench was nice, however I don’t assume that was our greatest basketball, however we bought a reasonably good probability, so it’s all about ready for some luck and staying wholesome.”
Slowly however certainly, the 76ers are lastly getting themselves again on observe following a catastrophic begin.
The large victory in opposition to their arch-nemesis and defending champions gave Philadelphia its eighth victory of the previous 11 video games.
Behind Tyrese Maxey’s 33 factors which had been backstopped by the 27 markers of Embiid, they’re now sitting on the eleventh spot of the East with an 11-17 card, a lot higher than the miserable scenario they’d within the first couple of weeks of the season in by enduring as little as a 3-14 file that positioned them on the depths of the Convention.
From coming into the season with championship hopes, the 76ers misplaced composure and confronted questions if they may nonetheless dwell as much as the expectations. From the fixed harm absences primarily round Embiid and Paul George, Philly miserably struggled and endured tons of criticism, with strategies to let 2024-25 go and as an alternative deal with subsequent yr.
As such, the brutal season-ending harm of their younger rising star simply made their scenario much more sophisticated.
But regardless of the struggles, the 76ers persevered and now boast a renewed positivity. And with loads of hoops nonetheless remaining on the calendar, they’ll solely be bullish to strongly emerge and pull a profitable season turnaround.
“I feel the most important factor that we’ve actually accomplished is we’ve come collectively much more,” Maxey mentioned. “I really feel like we had a whole lot of new guys. I don’t know what number of new folks we now have, like seven or one thing like that, and it’s tough.
“You don’t understand how you need to play. You don’t know what combos go together with one another.
“I feel we’re lastly figuring that out.”
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