There’s been a lot of dissection of the last 30 seconds of regulation in Game 5, when Tyrese Maxey, the firecracker Philly point guard, turned Madison Square Garden into his personal playground.
But the signs of the explosion were evident all night, even all series, and triggered with 4:33 left in the fourth quarter when Maxey pulled up from 28 feet, with no hesitation in his brain or legs, and buried a long trey.
It was the type of shot that jump-starts heaters — like the one Maxey used to score 12 of Philly’s final 18 regulation points.
Depending on how the next few days go, Maxey either postponed or canceled that celebration outside of 4 Penn Plaza.
“Once he got in rhythm,” Tom Thibodeau said, “he’s hard to slow down.”
As much of the focus of the fans, the media and the Knicks’ game plan has been on Embiid, Maxey has been their No. 1 headache.
He has averaged more points than Embiid (32.4 to 31.8), more minutes (44.9 to 41.6), more assists (7.2 to 6.4) and did it with greater efficiency (50 percent shooting to 43.5 percent).
It’s been Maxey’s intro to NYC on the heels of his Most Improved Player Award, roughly four years after the Knicks passed on the Kentucky product in the 2020 draft.
At the time, the organization was going all-in on Calipari players, but Maxey went to the division foe — while Leon Rose instead took Obi Toppin and Immanuel Quickley, Maxey’s Kentucky teammate.
Thus far, Tom Thibodeau hasn’t arrived at an effective solution to slow down Maxey. Part of that is by design — the Knicks are doubling or showing help against Embiid whenever he touches the ball in the post, often leaving Maxey — and the other part is the Sixers’ point guard is just blowing up the defense.
It’s the issue of New York’s numbers disadvantage in the series. The Knicks only have one All-Star (Jalen Brunson).
The Sixers have two.
“We did some different things [against Maxey],” Brunson said. “But good players always know when to adjust, so he kept adjusting.”
In the final Knicks-Sixers matchup of the regular season, Thibodeau’s game plan was to stick Donte DiVincenzo on Maxey. But that was abandoned from Game 1 of the playoffs.
Instead, the Knicks started with OG Anunoby on Maxey and, perhaps seeing he’s too slow to keep up, pivoted to mostly Miles McBride or Josh Hart.
Nobody has been consistently successful.
McBride in the fourth quarter of Game 4 provided probably the best defense thus far, and his defense in the fourth quarter of Game 5 was probably the worst.
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McBride is good at denying and chasing around Maxey when he doesn’t have the ball — a skill the young Knick flaunted when he held down Steph Curry in the regular season — but he’s been beaten off the dribble and can’t get through Embiid’s 300-pound screens.
Add the two potential mental lapses at the end of regulation Tuesday — when McBride should’ve fouled Maxey before his game-tying 3-pointer, and just prior when McBride probably should’ve gone under Embiid’s screen before Maxey’s four-point play over Mitchell Robinson — and it became a really rough evening at MSG.
“Just end-of-the-game management, we just all should’ve been on the same page, talking, communicating a lot more,” McBride said. “[Maxey] just made great shots.”
Hart doesn’t stand much of a chance of staying in front of Maxey if the Philly guard has running room. Maxey is too quick. If Robinson gets switched on Maxey, that’s been the worst matchup for the Knicks.
According to the NBA’s player tracking data, here are Maxey’s shooting numbers against primary defenders for the series:
vs. Hart: 44 points, 17 of 28 field goals
vs. McBride: 34 points, 14 of 27 field goals
vs. Robinson: 26 points, 9 of 14 field goals
vs Anunoby: 13 points, 5 of 13 field goals
vs. Hartenstein: 15 points, 6 of 14 field goals
The Maxey-Embiid two-man game has been the bugaboo for the Knicks, who’ve been selling out to stop Embiid while watching Maxey flourish.
“Every single possession they’re doubling me in the post, which is fine,” Embiid said. “We’re just going to keep making the right plays, you know, trust my guys to knock down those shots. And they’re in the gaps more, they’re really trying to pressure me so that’s where I try to use myself as a decoy. …Tyrese is going to come and make a wide-open layup or shoot it or be able to drive.”
What are the potential solutions?
Understanding Embiid is physically diminished, the Knicks can divert their pressure from the center to the point guard. Pick up Maxey 94-feet, deny him the ball, and make sure he doesn’t get the runway to flaunt his elite speed.
Or, they can put a smaller and more versatile defender on Embiid — whether it’s Anunoby or Precious Achiuwa — so there isn’t always a sitting duck against Maxey when a switch is necessary off screens.
Regardless, it’s virtually impossible to stop a player when he’s as red-hot as Maxey at the end of Game 5.
He’s the reason the Knicks took a trip down the NJ Turnpike for another grinding battle, rather than resting at home to prepare for the Eastern Conference semis.
And as they hope to avoid a Game 7, the Knicks have to again confront their biggest problem in this series.
“He’s a great player, but that’s on us,” Anunoby said. “We gotta execute better, we’ll be better.”
