For six months, very few people would even entertain the prospect of the 2025-26 Sixers season being encouraging, enjoyable or successful. And yet the 2025-26 Philadelphia 76ers have found a way to win once again. They are 4-0.
After three victories to begin the season ranging from thrilling to chaotic, the Sixers dug themselves a hole against a lowly Washington Wizards team but once again staged a double-digit turnaround, notching a 139-134 overtime victory on the road.
Tyrese Maxey and Joel Embiid were brilliant right away, but their early barrage of baskets was met by a greater one from the Wizards. The Sixers had a strong offensive night behind Embiid’s best scoring performance of the season, but for much of the game their defense was so putrid that it did not matter. Then the comeback crew did it again, erasing what was a 13-point deficit inside of the five-minute mark of the final frame as Maxey got hot down the stretch again while Quentin Grimes posted an outstanding stretch of two-way play. Adem Bona closed the game with Embiid at his minutes limit and blocked shot after shot. The Sixers found a way to force overtime, found themselves on the wrong end of a five-point deficit right when it started and still had enough to mount another comeback and emerge victorious, with Bona’s shot-blocking and offensive rebounding taking center stage.
This team just keeps one-upping itself. Takeaways from, amazingly, another winning night of Sixers basketball:
Sixers’ horrid defense creates a hole, then Quentin Grimes and Adem Bona lead the final comeback
Even during their wildly successful three-game stretch to begin the season, the Sixers did not defend well enough. They are undersized right now, and to some degree that will remain the case, but it is also not an excuse to struggle as much as they had been struggling. It is perhaps now the most important area where nine-time All-Star Paul George will help them.
Embiid has been one of the best defenders in the NBA for several years, but at this juncture he is a burden on that end of the floor as he manages every movement closely. It is easier to understand the Sixers’ struggles on defense when he is in the game just because his mobility is so limited. When he is off the floor, they have been unable to contain drivers and it puts undue stress on whichever player is filling in as a rim protector.
Many things can be pointed out here – that Washington made a ton of difficult shots; that the Wizards have so much youth and energy; that the Sixers were on the second leg of their first back-to-back of the year; that head coach Nick Nurse’s team was simply due for a rough night – but again, these defensive issues were not exclusive to Tuesday’s action. They just became so egregious that no talent advantage or individual scoring heaters could make up for their lack of cohesion.
It was not for a lack of trying offensively. Embiid was outstanding in tandem with Maxey; the two cornerstones of this team went all-in on embracing their lethal two-man work early and often in this one. It took away from VJ Edgecombe, Quentin Grimes and others’ chances to get shots up, but it was hard to argue with this:
Offense was never the Sixers’ problem in this game; they played more than well enough to win on that end of the floor. Embiid posting season-highs in points (25) and minutes (23) was an important benchmark. But Sixers’ defense went from very bad to dreadful in this one. It will have to be addressed moving forward, because even in their victories the Sixers were not doing nearly enough to provide resistance toward opposing offenses. It places too large of an offensive burden on the team’s stars.
Finally, down the stretch the Sixers started playing decent defense, with Bona’s five blocks at the center of it all. He also had the go-ahead basket, a jam off an offensive rebound:
Bona provided jaw-dropping plays time and time again, with Grimes serving as the perfect two-way role player in the clutch. The Sixers’ marvelous offensive attack suddenly had a chance to lead the way, and it did just that. Maxey ended up with an enormous 39-point performance, but the value Grimes and Bona gave in the biggest minutes of this game cannot possibly be overstated.
Trendon Watford makes his Sixers debut
After missing all of training camp and the preseason, the Sixers finally got a look at their lone external addition to the team’s standard roster via free agency over the summer. Watford, the 6-foot-9 point forward with a unique set of skills, was available in a limited role off the bench after being sidelined for the team’s first three games in the regular season.
Watford kicked off his Sixers career by bullying Wizards rookie Tre Johnson en route to an easy left-handed jump hook:
The 24-year-old forward’s minutes were largely encouraging, particularly given his unusual style. Watford is not exactly an easy player to drop into a preexisting rotation; he does a lot of things that most players at his size are never asked to do when it comes to ball-handling. His first stint lasted about eight minutes, which was a pleasant surprise in itself.
Watford moved a lot better than one would expect for a player who was returning from such a longstanding hamstring ailment, and even without a jaw-dropping box score line his overall utility on this roster was evident right away. Watford made plenty of nifty passes, and his very first possession with Embiid was a picture-perfect pick-and-pop resulting in an Embiid triple. The Sixers were looking for him as soon as they grabbed defensive rebounds so he could initiate transition offense.
For Watford’s fit to not look particularly shaky right away is a major win for the Sixers, and it bodes well for his ability to carve out a niche within this offense moving forward.
Odds and ends
Some additional notes:
• Nurse made a change to his starting lineup with Dominick Barlow (elbow) still sidelined. Instead of starting Jabari Walker at power forward, Nurse plugged in Justin Edwards as a small-ball four. Washington started two small guards, two wings and one big, so Nurse did not feel compelled to be as big against one of the tinier starting units in the NBA. Of course, the other change was Embiid starting over Bona.
• Jabari Walker’s best stint as a member of the Sixers came in the first half on Tuesday; he scored eight points and grabbed three rebounds (two offensive) in a six-minute burst while also nabbing a steal. But he was not part of the rotation in the second half. Walker has some competition for frontcourt minutes moving forward; Watford has joined a mix that will once again include Barlow soon. George’s eventual return looms large as well.
• This was Edgecombe’s quietest NBA game yet from an offensive perspective, yet the rookie still managed to convert two separate four-point plays. He really is fearless:
Edgecombe handled the ball much less than usual, but was just as ambitious as a spot-up three-point shooter and had plenty of success, knocking down four triples. Clearly, the Sixers needed each one of them.
Up next: The Sixers will have two days off before returning to action at home, where they will play host to the Boston Celtics in the opening game of NBA Cup Group Play.
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