When it looked like they were about to silence much of the critics, the Philadelphia 76ers have once again put themselves in the eye of the storm by failing to putthe first-round series of the 2021-22 NBA playoffs away.
The Sixers will be back in Toronto on Thursday night for Game 6, in which they’ll try to get the job done not only to move forward in their quest for the championship, but also to prove the doubters wrong.
While this will test James Harden and Doc Rivers‘ ability to win big playoff games, everyone at theteam has reasonsto be concerned as they could enter the NBA history books for the wrong reasons should they fail to beat the Raptors.
NBA playoffs: The embarrassing record Sixers will try to avoid this year
If the Raptors turn the series around, it would not only produce pain in Philadelphia for the come-from-behind elimination itself. It would also mean an unprecedented collapse by an NBA team in a postseason.
The Philadelphia 76ers could become the first team in NBA history to blow a 3-0 lead in a playoff series. The Sixers got off to a strong start against Toronto by winning their first three games but the Raptors bounced back with two statement victories to put them under a lot of pressure ahead ofGame 6.
The Sixers lead the series 3-2 after losing to the Raptors on Game 5. (Tim Nwachukwu/Getty Images)
No team has ever blown a 3-0 lead in the NBA playoffs, although three teams were forced to a Game 7. So even if they lose on Thursday, the Sixers would still have one more chance to avoid being the first team of an unprecedented list. Blowing this series would be especially painful for this Sixers team, given that James Harden and Doc Rivers already have a complicated playoff history. The coach, however,has recently addressed his previous failures.
Doc Rivers opens up about the times his teams blew a 3-1 lead
Doc Rivers is the only NBA coachto lead more than one team that blew a 3-1 lead in a playoff series, a stigma that seems to have followed him over the last few years around the league. His first debacle came in 2003, when the Magic lost to eventual champions Pistons. The second one came in 2015, whenthe Clippers lost to the Rockets after leading 3-1, while the latest blow took place in the 2020 Orlando Bubble, where his Clippers were knocked out by the Nuggets.
Doc Rivers in Game 7 of the Clippers-Nuggets series in the 2020 Orlando bubble. (Douglas P. DeFelice/Getty Images)
This year, he could add an even more embarrassing episodeshould the Raptors win the series. Rivers, however, has explained that most teams find it difficult to make it 4-0 even after three unanswered wins.
“Being up 3-0, especially 3-0, I would say that [teams feel differently],” Rivers said, per Tim Bontemps of ESPN. “A lot of teams don’t win those games. The Celtics are the only one that won that game [in the first round of this year’s playoffs]. Everyone else lost that game.From a coaching standpoint, you hate that, because you feel like, ‘Let’s just take care of it.’ Then you get to Game 5 the other night and they played better. We didn’t play well. We didn’t play with a sense of urgency. So clearly now, I think both teams have kind of served notice and both teams have the other team’s attention. If you don’t have that, then we’re all in trouble.”
The Sixers make the trip to Toronto on Thursday night aiming to close this series once and for all in Game 6 of the first round of the 2021-22 NBA playoffs. If they don’t, the Raptors would be just one win away from becoming the first NBA team to overcome a 0-3 deficit.
