BOSTON — Joel Embiid was not too happy with the Philadelphia 76ers’ defensive performance on Monday.
The Sixers got knocked around by the Boston Celtics 117-101 in Game 1 of their second-round NBA playoff series, and it was due in large part to downright appalling defense at some points.
While Philly did hit some timely shots in the second half, it pretty much all was negated by the fact that the Celtics could walk into the lane and had wide open looks from the perimeter off the screen.
Following the game, Embiid gave a harsh, but honest and somewhat NSFW assessment of both his defensive performance and that of his teammates.
“It starts on defense. I thought I was shitty, I thought we were all bad tonight, so that’s not who we are definitely, and I think when everybody’s on we’re the best defensive team in the game,” Embiid said. “There’s a lot of stuff in the gameplan that we didn’t execute, especially with Al (Horford) popping and him being wide open. That can’t happen. He’s a pretty good shooter, so you’ve got to respect that. So there’s a lot of adjustments we’ve got to make and just correct them and we’re going to be fine.”
Embiid did register a game-high 31 points as he dominated the Celtics on the offensive end. But for a team that had the third-highest defensive rating in the NBA this season, Monday’s performance clearly was below their standard.
