Joel Embiid is slated to make his season debut Tuesday when the Philadelphia 76ers host the scuffling New York Knicks.
Tuesday’s game is part of the NBA Cup, which features six groups of five teams. The Sixers and Knicks are part of East Group A, along with the Brooklyn Nets, Orlando Magic and Charlotte Hornets. The group-play contest also is a showdown between two squads off to a slow start.
Philadelphia’s plan to showcase the dynamic trio of Embiid, Tyrese Maxey and Paul George had been put on the backburner. Embiid missed the entire preseason and the first nine regular-season games — first while managing left knee soreness and more recently due to a three-game suspension for shoving a reporter.
George (knee) sat out the first five games and has played the last four, but not long after he returned, Maxey had a hamstring injury that will sideline him for multiple weeks.
The availability issues have left the Sixers in an early-season funk. They blew a 16-point fourth-quarter lead Sunday against Charlotte before recovering to win 107-105 in overtime to snap a five-game losing streak.
“We should still be playing at a high level and competing, trying to win games,” George said. “But no doubt about it, you get somebody back like (Embiid), it’ll make everybody’s job a little easier.”
Embiid averaged a career-high 34.7 points and 11.0 rebounds while being limited to 39 games due to injury last season. He had a terrific shooting year from the field (52.9 percent), the 3-point arc (38.8 percent) and the foul line (88.3), all while averaging career highs in assists (5.6) and steals (1.2).
“I mean, obviously, we’re not where we want to be without the big fella,” George said. “Someone as talented as him … obviously, he’s the (missing) piece.”
Embiid’s first challenge will be to exact some revenge on the Knicks, who eliminated the Sixers in the first round of last season’s playoffs.
New York’s Jalen Brunson averaged 35.5 points and 9.0 assists in that six-game series, while Josh Hart (16.8 points, 12.3 rebounds, 4.5 assists), was all over the court. Embiid averaged 33.0 points and 10.8 rebounds, while Maxey scored in 29.8 points per contest.
“We’re resilient,” Brunson said after New York finished off Philadelphia in Game 6. “No matter what the outside people say, positive or negative, we know what we’ve got to do. We’re going to stick together and that’s not going to change with us. I like that that’s how we think.”
The Knicks’ resilience has been put to the test already this season. New York has dropped three of its last four games — including double-digit defeats against the Houston Rockets and Indiana Pacers.
Brunson (33 points) and first-year Knick Karl-Anthony Towns (30) paced New York in Sunday’s 132-121 defeat to Indiana, as the team was doomed by its own 7-of-25 shooting from 3-point range, combined with a 21-of-46 effort from long range by the Pacers.
“We gave up way too much,” Knicks coach Tom Thibodeau said. “(We) didn’t cover the (3-point) line. We gotta fix it, and we gotta fix it fast. … We have to be strong on both sides of the ball. If we’re just gonna rely on offense, we’re not gonna be a good team.”