Joel Embiid‘s knee injury makes the Game 3 win loom even larger for the Sixers

It will be remembered mostly for an off-target kick, a bull’s-eye smack, and flagrant disregard for family jewelry, but the Sixers’ 102-97 Game 3 road win over Brooklyn on Thursday was much more than a couple of frustrated superstars going nuts and the MVP favorite coming up lame.

It was a game that saw Joel Embiid play through a sprained right knee. Embiid left the court and went to the locker room at least twice when he came out of the game in his normal pattern of substitution. The report was optimistic that Embiid might miss only one or two games, but it’s more realistic that he’ll miss the rest of the series.

The win gave the Sixers a 3-0 lead in the best-of-seven series, and no NBA team has ever lost a series with that advantage. The Sixers are 7-0 against the Nets this season including the playoffs. It will take a little more effort and a little sharper coaching, but the eighth win will come sooner or later. They can end it Saturday afternoon in Brooklyn. Whatever comes after that depends on mobility, rehab, and pain tolerance. The euphoric feeling from Game 3 dissipated when the news about Embiid’s knee landed Friday night.

Imagine how things would feel if the Sixers had lost Thursday night. Imagine if it was 2-1 instead of 3-0.

It was a game the Sixers were supposed to lose. A game that, in the Embiid and Doc Rivers era, they always lose. Remember Games 5 and 7 against the Hawks in the 2021 Eastern Conference semifinals? Not Thursday. On Thursday, Rivers marshaled an existential effort from a team whose leaders led in nothing but cheap shots and absence. Given the huge, looming absence, Rivers will have to marshal the best of the rest again.

» READ MORE: After nearly kicking his way out of Game 3, Joel Embiid is lucky to learn from a win

Embiid’s kick at Nic Claxton’s groin early that might have gotten Embiid tossed; it was deemed a flagrant 1. James Harden’s jockstrap smack on Royce O’Neale late in the third quarter was a flagrant 2, which earns an ejection. These, and other misadventures, helped put Rivers in position to blow another postseason series lead. Instead, on hostile ground policed by sketchy referees, the Sixers’ depth and fortitude carried the day.

This team is different.

The NBA did not suspend Embiid or Harden for Game 4. This speaks volumes. Embiid and Harden, unlike Warriors forward Draymond Green, are not perpetual goons, and Green’s perpetual goonery is what earned him a one-game suspension after he stomped on the chest of Kings center Domantas Sabonis.

Further, Embiid was responding to a taunt; Claxton stood over him and glared.

There is no comparison.

Harden’s offense wasn’t as much a foul as a flop. At any rate, the Sixers persevered.

“We didn’t do a lot of things right. We just hung in there and won the game,” Rivers said. “I didn’t think any of us played well tonight. This was a team win.”

Embiid made just five field goals, the fewest he’s made in a Sixers win in which he played normal minutes since Nov. 29, 2021, against the Magic. He played with five fouls for the last 5 minutes, 20 seconds. But he played, and was effective for 38 minutes. Clearly, his production suffered due to the knee, but you cannot quantify the toughness he showed.

Harden dropped 21 points and was cooking when, at the beginning of a move to the basket, he made contact with O’Neale’s midsection.

This happened with 13.6 seconds to play in the third quarter. Harden flatly denies hitting O’Neale in the groin, and he denies any intent, and his case is sound. The NBA, in hindsight, apparently agrees. O’Neale collapsed like a butchered cow in the moment but he bounced right back up after Harden was dismissed and made both free throws. To no avail.

Again: No NBA team has ever blown a 3-0 series lead. Not even Doc. That seems the least likely thing to happen to this Sixers team.

It seems much more likely, after Thursday, that the Sixers give the Boston Celtics all they can handle in the second round, assuming Embiid returns. It seems much more likely that this edition finally reaches the Eastern Conference finals. And if that happens, it seems likely that you should expect much, much more.

A win Saturday isn’t impossible, and it cannot be overvalued, since it would afford the aching and aged club a week or 10 days of rest. This team might swipe at yours now and then, but it has as much ... heart? ... as anybody in the tournament.

Rivers warned his players that the Nets would be desperate. That they would foul like the Heat and they would taunt like the Lakers and they would flop like the Celtics. They had nothing to lose: “You’re up, 2-0. What do you expect?”

It worked early.

“There were so many guys struggling,” Rivers said. “A lot of guys got in their [own] heads.”

Everybody except P.J. Tucker, the invisible man, who scored three points in almost 30 minutes and had a neck problem and, with eight rebounds and four assists and immeasurable intangibles, was everything.

“P.J. Tucker won the game for us,” Rivers said.

» READ MORE: Sixers vs. Nets prediction: Will Philly’s defense stifle Brooklyn again?

So did Tyrese Maxey, the Fourth Option, who scored 10 straight points in the final minutes of the fourth quarter. He led the Sixers with 25 points.

Tobias Harris scored 15 and grabbed seven boards. He’s averaged 18.7 points and 7.7 rebounds, and he’s shot 56.1% from the field and hit 60% (6-for-10) of his three-pointers. He’s been the glue.

In Harden’s absence, the defensive assignment for Mikal Bridges fell to De’Anthony Melton. Bridges missed nine of his last 10 shots.

This is the mark of a good team. A very good team. The kind of team that can take down a seasoned Celtics club. The kind of team that can beat the Bucks at their best.

The kind of team that can win an NBA championship … if the big fella’s knee cooperates.