Led by a battered and bruised Joel Embiid, this Sixers team has guts

Put yourself in Joel Embiid’s enormous shoes for a moment.

You’re dealing with Bell’s palsy, a condition that weakens the muscles on one side of your face. It makes it hard to blink and even do something as simple as take a drink. You’ve suffered migraines for the last couple weeks — the most recent one being so bad that you had to miss shootaround. You’re also still not fully back from the meniscus surgery you underwent in early February.

On top of that, nearly 20,000 people are cursing your name.

“If I’ve got to be the punching bag and you hear a lot of ‘F Embiid,’ that’s OK,” Embiid told reporters, “I love it.”

Embiid posted a triple-double in the Sixers’ season-saving overtime win in Game 5 at Madison Square Garden. While it was Tyrese Maxey who did the real saving, the reigning MVP trudged through a mucky nine-turnover outing to make plenty of big plays of his own.

The buckets weren’t there Tuesday for the two-time scoring champ. He scored only 19 points on 7-of-19 from the field. Since Embiid dropped 50 in Game 3, Tom Thibodeau has been more brazen with his double teams.

That in addition to Embiid not being at his MVP level physically made it difficult — despite his joy of playing the villain.

“It usually gets me going in those situations,” he said, “because you want to push yourself in those situations and kind of shut them up.”

Embiid didn’t shut up the Tracy Morgans and Ben Stillers of Knicks fandom with huge shots like Maxey, but the reigning MVP was sure up to the task defensively and on the glass when the game was truly on the line.

Rebounding has been perhaps the biggest storyline of this series. The team that’s won the battle of the boards has won the game. New York was the best offensive-rebounding team in the NBA this season. They pulled down 23 in Game 1 and 15 in a pivotal Game 4. On Tuesday, they had just six. Embiid pulled down 16 rebounds on his own. No other player for either team was in double digits.

Defensively, he was a monster down the stretch. Jalen Brunson scorched the Sixers for 47 points in Game 4. While Brunson, who scored 40, was still excellent in Game 5, the Sixers (mostly) kept him in check down the stretch. The biggest reason was Embiid.

For much of the series, the Sixers have felt comfortable allowing Embiid to play drop coverage on Brunson pick-and-rolls. They had plenty of success with that in Games 1 and 2, but the crafty guard adjusted and has been punishing the Sixers with an array of short fadeaways and floaters when Embiid has been at the rim.

Head coach Nick Nurse adjusted his coverage more than he had all series in Game 5. Brunson was matched up with just about every perimeter defender the Sixers have. They also showed some zone and, in critical late possessions, Embiid either met Brunson at the level of the screen or flat-out switched onto him.

Embiid more than held his own, coming up with a huge block and forcing Brunson into turnovers and tough shots.

“He obviously was not feeling great,” Nurse told reporters. “It was a tough game for him, very difficult, but he found a way to do that stuff. I mean, he can block shots, he can strip the ball. We’ve all seen him do that when he’s super engaged and trying to get a stop. It was good that he finally came up and was able to dig down and do that.”

When Embiid played the entire second half of Game 4, you could tell he wasn’t physically capable of making an impact. Nurse was prepared to try to do it again in Game 5, but Embiid clearly wasn’t right. A pair of fairly egregious turnovers forced Nurse to rethink the strategy and use Nicolas Batum as a small-ball five. That rest, which was just over a minute of game action, clearly helped.

It’s fair to wonder in previous spots if Embiid would’ve been able to “dig down” like he did late in Game 5. His postseasons have routinely been marred by injuries and it’s always been obvious that it affects Embiid’s mental state.

When Embiid is putting forth that kind of effort, despite how he’s feeling, it reverberates throughout the entire team.

“That was the scheme going into the whole year, right?” Kelly Oubre, Jr. told reporters. “Being ultra-aggressive on the perimeter, funneling everything into our 7-foot-2 beast down there. Obviously he’s fighting his battles right now. But at the end of the day, the will that he has and the will that we all have to just try to get stops and give that effort is everything.”

Embiid wasn’t the only one that missed shootaround and wasn’t quite feeling himself. Oubre was also under the weather, dealing with a similar illness that befell Maxey last week in New York.

Oubre fought all night on the defensive end and pitched in just enough offense (14 points). He also scored what was ultimately the game-winning bucket — despite nearly disastrously flubbing it.

“I feel like dog water right now … but dogs drink it,” Oubre told reporters.

In seasons past, this feels like a game the Sixers lose without a whimper. There’s a bit more fight and bite to this team, led by players like Oubre who are hungry to prove themselves and to win.

Oubre was asked if he saw “the season flash before his eyes” late in the game. Oubre rejected that notion bluntly:

“No.”

The Sixers still have serious work to do. To win the series, they’re eventually going to have to return to MSG for a Game 7. Before that, they have to take care of business on their home court Thursday night in Game 6.

Embiid is going to have to keep battling through everything.

“I just woke up with a bad migraine,” Embiid told reporters. “I guess it has something to do with the face and stuff, so just got to keep fighting.”

Through all the postseason injuries and illnesses, Embiid has yet to power through them — as difficult as that might be. This year, he’s doing all he can.

“I’m OK,” he said. “We won. That’s all I care about.”

Whatever happens Thursday, Embiid and the Sixers have shown something previous iterations of this team have lacked: guts.