PHILADELPHIA _ In the early fall of 2016, before he'd ever appeared in a regular-season NBA game, Joel Embiid commandeered the nickname "The Process," but the moniker was always a better fit for another 76er who better personified the true spirit of the term. To look at T.J. McConnell is to see a walking, talking stereotype: an undrafted point guard who sports the league's severest hair part and whose official height of 6-foot-2 is a generous lie; a too-slow, too-short _ and, since we're dealing in stereotypes here, too-white _ nobody who got a shot in the NBA only because for years under Sam Hinkie the Sixers were pretty much offering open tryouts to anyone who'd ever bounced a basketball.
Except there the Sixers were Monday night, needing a victory in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference semifinals to keep their season alive, and there was McConnell, again reaffirming just how much a team studded with some of the brightest, most ballyhooed stars in the NBA needs him. The Sixers did fend off the Celtics, 103-92, to push the series to a Game 5 on Wednesday night at TD Garden, and Embiid was excellent, with 15 points and 13 rebounds and a tenacious defensive effort. And Ben Simmons looked more like himself. And Dario Saric had 25 points. But it was McConnell, a surprise insertion by coach Brett Brown into the starting lineup, who stole the night: collecting 19 points, five assists, and seven rebounds; never turning the ball over; delivering a charge to the Wells Fargo Center whenever it seemed the building and the Sixers had to have one.
McConnell wasn't merely an inspiration Monday night. He was indispensable, a primary reason that the Sixers survived to play another game, a player whom, one could argue, Brown should have counted on earlier in the series. That crushing Game 2 loss had ended in such controversy, with the Sixers squandering a 22-point lead and regaining an advantage late with McConnell on the floor, only to have Brown ride with Simmons for the final five minutes. The Celtics rallied back to take control of the series, and McConnell continued to reveal his importance in Game 3, when it became clear that he was the only Sixer guard with the lateral quickness to contain Terry Rozier.
Though Brown did not hint at any lineup changes for Game 4 during his pregame meeting with the media, it turned out he couldn't ignore what was in front of everyone's face any longer. He benched Robert Covington and started McDonnell, assembling a three-guard lineup that presumably would improve the Sixers' perimeter defense. Rozier shot 4-for-11. The Celtics shot less than 35 percent from 3-point range. And McConnell _ who started just one game during the regular season _ was a dynamo over his 39 minutes.
At the end, with less than two minutes left in regulation, he burrowed into the lane for a layup, stretching the Sixers' lead to 12. Minutes earlier, the fans in the stands had been chanting his name, screaming for the longest of long shots to come out of The Process. It was a sight to see.
