PHILADELPHIA _ It must be something about the Boston Celtics.
They have the 76ers' number regardless on who's on Philly's roster. This time, the Celtics prevailed, 112-109, Tuesday night at the Wells Fargo Center.
The Sixers and Celtics both have identical 36-21 records following the outcome. However, Boston is fourth in the Eastern Conference standings while the Sixers are fifth. That's because the Celtics have the tiebreaker due to clinching the season series. The teams will play their fourth and final regular-season contest on March 20 in Philadelphia.
This marked the Sixers' third game since acquiring Tobias Harris and reserves Boban Marjanovic, Mike Scott, Jonathon Simmons, and James Ennis before Thursday's trade deadline.
The thought was that they would change the Sixers' fortune against Boston.
But at this time, it doesn't matter who the Sixers players are. They still can't beat the Celtics.
Philly lost to Boston in five games last season in the second round of the Eastern Conference playoffs. Then with Robert Covington and Dario Saric still on the roster, the Sixers suffered a season-opening setback to Boston. Those two players were replaced by Jimmy Butler once the teams squared off on Chirstmas. The Celtics still won.
This time, the Sixers wanted to cut down on their turnovers and the Celtics 3-point attempts. On Christmas, Philly had 19 turnovers in the 121-114 overtime setback. Boston had 41 3-point attempts that game, making 14.
On this night, the Sixers committed 14 turnovers. The Celtics, meanwhile, attempted 29 3-pointers, making 13. They came into the game averaging 35.3.
Al Horford, once again, was a matchup problem for Joel Embiid.
The Celtics center was 9 for 16 from the field, including going 3 for 5 on 3-pointers en route to finishing with 23 points. He also had eight rebounds and four steals. Embiid, however, scored his 23 points on 9-for-22 shooting. He went 2 of 8 on 3s. The two-time All-Star did post his league-leading 47th double-double by also producing a game-high 14 rebounds to go with two blocks.
The Sixers also had a tough time containing Gordon Hayward.
The Celtics reserve guard made a season-high six 3-pointers in seven attempts to finish with a game-high 26 points. His sixth 3-pointer gave Boston a 105-103 lead with 1 minute, 50 seconds left. Boston went up three points thanks to a Marcus Smart foul shot 23 seconds later.
The Sixers had a chance to knot the score after Butler was fouled while attempting a 3-pointer with 1:13 to play. He was awarded three foul shots, but only made one of them. So the Sixers trailed by two.
The Celtics then went up by four points after a Smart dunk. But Butler had a three-point play with 16.1 seconds left to close the gap to one point (108-107).
Boston went back up by three after Horford made a pair of foul shots three seconds later. After a timeout, Embiid's putback of a Harris missed three-pointer made it a 110-109 game with 2.4 seconds remaining..
But the Celtics went on to win after Tatum hit a pair of foul shots with 1.8 left.
Butler had 22 points to go with nine rebounds. Meanwhile, Harris struggled. He had 10 points on 4-for-14 shooting and missed all six of his 3-point attempts.
However, the Sixers also used to game to evaluate some of their reserves.
"There's sort of a quiet tournament going on with Furkan (Korkmaz) and Simmons and James Ennis, which one of those wings will emerge," Brown said. "There is an undercurrent that I don't want to forget about Jonah Bolden."
The coach knows he'll need the rookie post player if he's feels one of three wings' performance isn't built for garnering postseason minutes.
"Then I have the ability to have Tobias come back to a three and bring Jonah into a four," Brown said. "So there is a flexibility that we will learn more about, and I have 20 whatever games to do that."
Beginning Wednesday night at the New York Knicks, the Sixers will have 25 games to identify who's playing in the postseason. The Sixers will shrink their 10-man rotation to nine at the start of the playoffs.
Simmons, Korkmaz and Ennis all receive equal minutes during this "tournament."
Simmons (seven points, one steal) played 14:31 on Tuesday while Korkmaz (two points)was on the floor for 10;46 and Ennis didn't play.
Brown was curious to see Simmons stalk Celtics point guard Terry Rozier on defense. He was also curious to see him play the perimeter defense that he's known for producing.
He picked up his second foul 4 minutes, 9 seconds into his first stint off the bench. He was subbed out by T.J. McConnell during the timeout following the foul.
But a lot of his rotations will depend on who is the best for the team they're facing for the rest of the regular season.
"I feel as time unfolds and gets to that stage of the season in early April, I think I'm going to know," Brown said.
