When the first round between the Nets and Philadelphia 76ers begins on Saturday, it will be just the fourth time in franchise history that the two Eastern Conference rivals will meet in the postseason. And it’s the first time since a physical five-game series between the two clubs in 2019 that the Nets and Sixers will play in the playoffs.
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The Nets enter the series the underdogs, something that the team has not concerned itself with, and are looking to shock the NBA world following a roller coaster season in Kings County. It’s no secret what the biggest challenge will be for the Nets, that of course being the ability to stop Joel Embiid, but there are a number of things that could make or break their first-round series with Philly.
Here’s a look at some of the storylines and matchups facing the Nets against the Sixers.
Stopping Joel Embiid
This may be the most obvious talking point going into Game 1 at Wells Fargo Center. Embiid is one of the NBA’s elite players and keeping him from putting up points won’t be an easy task by any stretch of the imagination. The Sixers superstar leads the NBA in points per game, with 33.1, is second in the league in efficiency and is shooting 54.8% from the field.
What also makes him dangerous is his ability to get to the free-throw line. He averaged 11.7 free throw attempts per game during the regular season, which was second most only behind Giannis Antetokounmpo.
Nets head coach Jacque Vaughn had said following Tuesday’s practice in Brooklyn that it would be a group effort to contain Embiid. However, a good chunk of that responsibility will be on Nets’ big man Nic Claxton.
“I think he has learned how, and I talked about it before, to play against different centers in the league,” Vaughn said. “How they offer different challenges for him and what his advantages are. I talked about it the other night; you want to lean into your gifts, not your deficiencies. And he has some gifts, so he’s gonna lean into those, because that’s beneficial for us. And we’ll try to stay away from those deficiencies, and I think we’ll be ok.”
As for keeping Embiid from killing them from the free-throw line, Vaughn said that there were just some shots that the Sixers star was going to hit and they had to be OK with that.
“The free ones we can’t give to him: the reach-ins, the tap on the arm, the sweep through, we just gotta be smart and disciplined in how we guard him,” Vaughn said.
Shooting beyond the arc
The Nets’ strategy since they traded Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving has been pretty transparent. Brooklyn is a team that loves to shoot the ball from beyond the arc and their success, or lack thereof, has dictated the game plenty of times. The Nets have attempted 37.6 three-point attempts per game dating back to Feb. 11, which is sixth most in the NBA during that time frame, and the 13.3 three-pointers made are among the top 10 in the league during that span.
“Yeah, I think it’ll certainly be a key,” Joe Harris said. “I think the biggest thing will be our ability to get out in transition. A lot of times those transition attempts do turn into good three-point looks. So they’re kinda definitely correlated.”
Nets-Sixers, a budding rivalry?
The series between the Nets and 76ers in 2019 feels like a lifetime ago, but there are still two players on the Brooklyn roster that were there for that series. Spencer Dinwiddie and Harris are now helping to lead the Nets again four years later.
There is a lot of recent history between the Nets and 76ers, especially with the blockbuster trade that sent James Harden to the City of Brotherly Love and Ben Simmons to Kings County. Still, the Nets have been reluctant to classify any of their meetings with the Sixers as rivalry games.
Even as Harris conceded it was kind of a rivalry matchup, there were still some caveats to it.
“There’s crossover with players. Yeah, I think a little bit,” Harris said. “Also the proximity. This is an easy bus trip for us. The only other team we have that with is New York with the Knicks, so given the amount of times we’ve played against each other over the years, playoff series over the years. I don’t know. I guess it’s kinda hard to define rivalries in the NBA today, but this would be as close as it would come.”
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