Inside Game 5’s fourth quarter, which kept the Sixers’ season alive: ‘I didn’t want to go home’

BOSTON — VJ Edgecombe grabbed the offensive rebound off a missed Tyrese Maxey jumper, and the ball found Paul George for a three-pointer that flipped a one-point 76ers’ deficit into a two-point advantage.

Perhaps that sequence to open the fourth quarter was the foreshadowing of how the final frame would unfold for the Sixers in Tuesday’s must-win Game 5 at the Celtics.

The Sixers defended and rebounded. Joel Embiid, in his second game back from an appendectomy, asserted himself offensively and the Sixers appropriately complemented the former MVP. They hit timely three-pointers.

They were everything they had not been in the losses to dig themselves into a three-games-to-one hole in this best-of-seven first-round series. And they were everything they need to be against this particular opponent, not just in keeping their season alive with a 113-97 pull-away victory at TD Garden but in order to extend this series again beyond Thursday’s Game 6 in Philly.

“We really locked in,” said Embiid, who scored eight of his 33 points in the fourth quarter.

» READ MORE: Joel Embiid and the Sixers were a serious team in Game 5. Give them that.

The Sixers outscored the Celtics 28-11 in that decisive final period, including a 12-0 run to extend a one-possession game into a double-digit lead.

Naturally, the surge originated on defense by limiting Boston to 3-of-22 shooting from the field. After a “very bad” performance on that end of the floor in their Game 4 flop, the Sixers’ individual defenders did a much better job keeping the ballhandler in front and not forcing teammates into rotations. Maxey also praised Embiid’s communication behind those perimeter teammates.

And the defensive commitment was perhaps best epitomized by Quentin Grimes, who dug in on Celtics star Jaylen Brown for the length of the court and forced a bad shot about midway through the quarter.

“I didn’t want to go home,” Grimes said. “I didn’t want it to be the last game.”

After getting blasted on the boards for the bulk of this series, the Sixers held a 16-14 rebounding edge in Tuesday’s fourth and limited the Celtics to one second-chance point. Five of Maxey’s 10 rebounds came in that frame, a product of being “just tired of giving up rebounds, to be completely honest with you.”

“We’re playing so hard defensively, we’ve got to reward ourselves,” Maxey said. “Because [if] we get a defensive rebound, now we can go play in space [on offense]. Guys can get a little more freedom and a little bit more leeway to go out there and maybe shoot some pull-up threes and get downhill and score.”

The Sixers made nine of their 17 shot attempts in the fourth quarter. Every player who was on the floor during the meaningful minutes converted at least one field-goal attempt. And Embiid’s presence, in the lead-up to the fourth and during that period, generated a bunch of that offense.

That came after a clunky Sunday, a re-acclimation period that Maxey acknowledged exists whenever Embiid returns from a health absence. Embiid also still had some shooting rust to shake, going 5-of-13 from the floor in the first half. Yet once Embiid “went to the post and he scored, and scored, and scored,” Maxey said, the double-teams returned.

The Sixers got up 10 fourth-quarter three-pointers compared to Boston’s eight, a let-it-fly number Maxey said “has to be that way” against these Celtics. Grimes buried one of those deep shots to cap an 18-point, off-the-bench performance, as part of a three-guard closing lineup. So did Edgecombe, a callback to his knack for such buckets during the regular season.

“I felt like we would get any shots we want,” Embiid said, “whether it was me scoring or kicking out for an open shooter.”

» READ MORE: Joel Embiid saves the Sixers, Quentin Grimes wakes up and other things we learned from improbable Game 5 win

After getting smashed in Game 4, Embiid stressed that the Sixers can only get one win back at a time. Nurse reiterated Tuesday that, in order to compete with the heavily-favored Celtics, “we’ve got to play really good.”

“Really good” means successfully — and, in some cases, finally — delivering on the elements that defined the Game 5’s fourth quarter, which kept their season alive.

“We just did a good job of being resilient,” Maxey said. “We’ve got to do it a couple more times.”