Tyrese Maxey has his Reggie Miller moment against the New York Knicks

It took until well after the game was over, but Tyrese Maxey finally showed his age.

A New York reporter asked him about Reggie Miller’s legendary eight points in nine seconds at Madison Square Garden, and Maxey essentially responded with a shrug.

“Our trainer Kevin Johnson was talking about that after the game,” Maxey said of Miller’s scoring flurry in the closing seconds of Game 1 of the 1995 Eastern Conference semifinals. “I’ll have to go back and watch it a little bit more. That was a long time ago.”

In fact, it was six years before he was born.

» READ MORE: Tyrese Maxey saves Sixers’ season with miracle performance in 112-106 Game 5 overtime win

The 76ers need a couple more W’s before Maxey earns a place among history’s greatest Knicker-clockers. If they lose a season-ending Game 6 at home, the locals won’t be talking about the fun they had along the way.

At the moment, though, the season lives on. It lives on because the Sixers had easy access to a defibrillator: a burgeoning superstar named Tyrese Maxey.

Maybe you skipped watching Game 5 because you had something better to do. You took the dog for a 2½-hour walk or prepaid next year’s taxes. Maybe you turned it off when the Sixers were outscored 32-17 in the second quarter. Or maybe you waited until they were down 94-88 with 59.2 seconds left in the fourth quarter.

Well, you missed something special.

The Sixers’ 112-106 overtime win over the Knicks in Game 5 may turn out to mean nothing. But the 23-year-old kid who was at the center of it all? He showed us something lasting.

There wasn’t a signature moment. There were two. The first came with 26.2 seconds left and the Sixers down 96-90. The Garden was rocking. The celebratory beers were flowing. The fingers were fully unclenched. The Knicks were on their way to the Eastern Conference semis in a series whose final 4-1 margin did not do the proceedings justice.

The Sixers had their moments. Moment 1: Jump out to a big lead. Moment 2: hit a wall, watch the Knicks slowly climb back to a dominant position.

Joel Embiid played one of the worst offensive games of his postseason career, his nine turnovers almost single-handedly undermining the Sixers’ best efforts. As a team, they shot just 8-of-27 from three-point range, outside of Maxey.

Thankfully, the Maxey buckets counted.

“I knew we had to get some threes up,” said the star of the show. “I just tried to get to a spot and raise and shoot.”

» READ MORE: Tyrese Maxey, new Sixers alpha, wills them to a Game 5 win in New York despite Joel Embiid’s struggles

They put the ball in the hands of their best player — for one night, at least — and magic happened. Down six, 26.2 seconds left, he got to his spot and got Josh Hart in the air. He hovered there, drew contact, and tossed up a shot that somehow found the net. Three points plus a foul shot, the latter of which he calmly sank.

“Thankfully he jumped,” Maxey said of the Knicks’ Mitchell Robinson, who was defending him. “I didn’t get my feet set right away to shoot it. I was able to just lean in and make a shot.”

Thankfully, the Sixers did the wise thing and asked him to do it again. And so he did. Next possession. Down three this time. He pulled up from the fringe of the half-court circle and swished through another.

“That’s just a lot of reps,” Maxey said. “Throwing the ball out, chasing it. [Sixers assistant] Rico [Hines] has been on us all year about shooting deep ones. I’ve been working on it all year.”

These were daggers. Professional daggers. The kind only the great ones land.

Maxey is headed in that direction. Just look at the final line: 46 points, 52 minutes, 17-of-30 from the field, 7-of-12 from three-point range.

“It went in our favor thanks to Tyrese Maxey,” Embiid said. “He was unbelievable.”

This wasn’t a near-death experience. It was the last of the Last Rites. They’d already lost a game they should have won. They’d already gotten the signature superstar game from Embiid. They were down 3-1, needing to win three straight, including two at the Garden, where they were already 0-2.

They weren’t getting Game 2 back. They weren’t getting Embiid’s left knee back. Nor his conditioning. Nor half of his face.

» READ MORE: Jalen Brunson, Knicks expect to grow from Game 5 loss: 'We can't hang our heads'

Even now, we can’t reasonably believe that Game 5 was anything more than a spasm from a team on the verge of rigor mortis. Grandpa may have sat up in his casket, sweetie, but this is still a funeral.

The Sixers don’t have a particularly glorious track record as a franchise. The one facet where they do excel is in conditioning their fans for the worst. Whenever you see a shoe fall in their vicinity, you wait for the other one to drop. Worst of all, the shoes are Skechers.

If you’ve followed the Sixers long enough, you know what happens next. Having willed their way to a new lease on life, having given their fans a chance to watch them force a Game 7, they lose decisively at home. Usually, they get booed off the court. This year, at least, it will be drowned out by the Knicks fans.

Often, end up wondering if it was worth it. You long for the days when there were no hopes and dreams and expectations and you could greet your May with peace.

Not this time.

Maxey is not just a silver lining. He is a plot twist. He is averaging 32.4 points this series. He has done it against the toughest of playoff defenses. He has carried his team to one win, and very nearly another. He has announced himself to the world.

In his four years with the Sixers, we’ve watched Maxey go from scratch-off ticket to budding star to bona fide All-Star. Yet, this series has been the most telling stretch of them all. He has become a difference-maker.