Embiid, Harden, Coaches Rivers x Vaughn React To Game 1 Of 76ers/Nets | April 15, 2026

Paul Reed and Tuck had an amazing impact on the game. I thought those two guys they just they got everyone. I think Jalen was involved too with the flexions keeping it alive. I thought we had a size advantage. We took advantage of that in our passing and our ability to force turnovers in that turn of all over. I think we ended up with 19 more shots. I'm not even looking I'm guessing that you're a win game. You know you look at it we shot 47 percent. They shot 55 shooting 63 at halftime but we're still up because we had more shots at the basket. That was huge for us. Overall what did you make of PJ's performance tonight? He was great. Just his energy. Just I think you know tonight like obviously our skill guys were great. James was James I thought one of his best games at being a I guess a catcher where he's calling the perfect game. But I thought our energy guys played a big part in this game. D'Anthony Melton, Jalen, Paul Reed, Tuck. I thought those four guys they had a huge imprint on the on why we won tonight. I feel like you can kind of see how much healthier he is on those step back threes he's hitting when he's down four feet and kind of just having that quick twitch back. Yeah well he's you know he's in shape. He's healthy. He's confident in how we play. Now last year everything was even when he was playing was am I doing the right thing here? You know so there was a lot of good there. What was the issues inside the arc in the first half? I think you guys you're shooting like 55 or 60 percent I'm thinking like 30 on twos. Was that something they were doing? Were you guys? No yeah we had good shots you know it's funny you know I thought I said it at halftime I said guys for the record we're getting great shots and we're not making them and that's okay because that's going to happen. There's nothing you can do about that. You know you miss open shots as a coach you live with it and but you got to find a way on those nights to do something else to help help win and I thought it was the extra shots then that turning the ball over and the forcing the turnovers. It also seemed like the early on in particular was sewn out on Joao. Yeah yeah for you guys to have a few of those threes go down at the beginning to take advantage. Yeah it always helps you know but we were going to stop shooting them. We worked on it all week you know and I give Joe credit because I thought especially early he was really patient you know and and and we sold that to him. You know you're going to end up with whatever amount of points no matter what happens and that happened but when you start making everybody else better and then we have James making everybody else better it makes us a pretty good team. You did just talk about Brooklyn Well you listen at halftime I really mean Bridges is destroying us and and the first half for him it was like being on the beach. I mean we he just kept curling in the paint wide open shots. Second half we we double teamed him a lot more. We got the ball out of his hands and I thought that was effective. What about Tobias Harrison? You had Harrison at 20 points and you had Harden. Is that is that also a byproduct of Harden beating everybody? Yeah yeah when Tobias is playing well when George has points it usually means the ball's moving. You know Tyrese too in some ways Tyrese can get his own and so can Tobias really but I just thought it just showed that we were trusting the pass. You know we made a couple passes a guy missed a shot and we threw right back to him. I mean we got to keep doing that that's that's our growth area and we just got to keep doing it. A lot of times this year we've talked about teams beating you guys in the way we broke on the offensive rebounds transition things like that I guess what do you think was the difference today that you guys flipped that script? Well we talked about it all week you know that helps we did we just thought there's some things that we can do you know every opponent is different but we thought we had a size advantage let's use it let's still get back in transition which we did overall first half I thought we lost their three-point shooters in transition a couple times but I thought we did both we were able to crash the glass and get back and take away their shots. Doc it felt like when you guys were going drop on McHale if he was getting you know tackling in space also some good weak side activity with you just make him play in traffic more I just thought he had you know I guess visualization he had the highway in the first half in the second half it was a traffic jam and that's how he has to play we can he's too good he's too long and that's the other thing that you know we talked with melt like when you're helping off of bridges and you get back he doesn't even see you he's too long you got to get under him and make him put the ball on the floor and I thought we did better than that you talked about the size of it you talked about the size advantage just obviously you guys have been efficient anyway yeah three but when you have that big a size advantage you got to come in and dig and ready to double and help but you still got to pass the ball um you know we we did a baseball thing all week where every pass was a ball or a strike and we were throwing a lot of balls and and you missed those shots but when you throw a lot of strikes right in the you make those shots and you guys I don't know if you saw a couple guys every time a guy tucked through one he was cuddling down on the floor strike two you know that's important for us to visualize you know on target passes help I thought we did that tonight why do you think joel has progressed so far and not just recognizing a double team recognizing what the immediate open pass is what the assist is going to be yeah it's a good question probably uh trust you know trusting his teammates um we work on it uh putting them in the elbow where he can see it uh and he works on it so probably all those together and maturity I mean all those things are probably all those things are the reason but it's good for him to see how much he can do with a pass to help his teammates uh that's a good thing for our team what did you make of the energy in the building tonight it was awesome it was great you know I always you know as a coach you always worry about literally literally everything and I you know I think I saw that one o'clock game and I was like oh I hope they go in at night tonight on Friday night in Philly and come out and it was awesome even last night you know you look out your window was blue everywhere uh it was really cool stuff you know and so uh they showed up whether they were out last night or not they showed up and that was good thanks guys efficiency especially recently and being double teams not just beating them and not turning the ball over but setting your team up for immediate shots it seems like there's been a pretty big jump in the last um just keeping it simple um you know like you want to drive okay okay no that's for daddy um I mean every single possession that just kept doubling you know it didn't matter where I was three-point line um post um so you know I just I gotta trust in my teammates gotta make the simple uh simple plays and uh you know and we we took advantage of uh that skin how important was the the effort on the offensive glass getting all those extra shots you want to go drive okay okay um it was important I mean you know anytime you can have you know I don't know like 15 you know 16 more shots than the opponent he helps a lot you gonna see mommy mommy's over there it's fine um anytime you can get you know uh you know more possessions than the other team he's always great um so you know we we took advantage of it and uh like I said we uh we scored a lot out of you know those doc talked about the way you guys are moving all around today especially from James Harden getting 13 assists kind of talk about that uh I mean he came from uh like I said that just double um you know that we're running all over the place um uh you especially for me uh to just invite the double team and you know make plays for my teammates um you know same thing for James uh anytime there was double and you know anytime you know there was a dribble penetration uh he made the right play every single time and what do you think went wrong against bridges in the first half and would you guys need to correct that we let him get comfortable um you know everything he was getting he was getting downhill um you know he was getting a bunch of pull-up jumpers and um you know uh it's not easy uh being the star or me being the main guy so as soon as you know we saw that um you know we just doubled him uh get the ball out got the ball out of his hands and uh walked out pretty well for us did you think of uh it was great uh you know like I said him and pj um extra possessions uh and then um you know I thought he did a good uh great job screening bowling uh playing you know out of that dunker um getting easy passes and finishing uh you know made a great move um you know behind the back that we probably don't want to see again but I'm just kidding he can do whatever he wants whatever works uh you know I guess uh gotta keep doing it but uh James Harden was talking about how much healthier he is now compared to last year in your view how much more comfortable and healthy is he going to these playoffs he looked great um you know just like I said just dribble penetration um you know um you know setting up guys uh he shot look great uh from three uh he got uh he got his shot blocked a few times at the rim but he's gonna happen and I'm sure next time he's gonna finish it but you know he looks amazing and that's great to see doc called him he said he was a uh a catcher almost the way he was calling the game today you've talked a bunch of times how you thought he's the best playmaker in the league the way he was playing today and that facet is that what you guys are going to need to get reworked in terms of the way yeah yeah I think you know uh like I said best playmaker in the league uh by but you know you don't we don't want him and so suddenly me I don't want him to fall in love with just that uh need him to be aggressive and he was today just attacking and by him attacking he collapses the defense and you know it creates you know open shots for everybody else so you know p replaying in the dunker you know easy drop off passes so you know I think you know the keys you know not just being a playmaker just being aggressive you know going downhill and creating for himself and you know everyone else thanks joe you ready you want to go home you want daddy to hold out the hole okay let's go thank you anybody what was uh what was working for you guys tonight from distance with all the threes something that was giving us you know I mean they just they doubled joe the whole whole game basically you know I mean tried their best to not let him get going uh he still had 20 something but I think he did a really good job of just making the easy passes and you know we knocked shots down how much of that must be contagious if he's doing playing so well off those double teams and it kind of helps everyone else it makes it easy you know I mean like he's he's gonna get his buckets no matter what that's just how good he is um and then you know we're making shots we attack in the basket and we just generate easier shots for us and I think that's what's uh that was the key tonight with that being said game two is gonna be much more difficult you know I mean they're gonna make adjustments and we're gonna make adjustments so uh it's gonna be the most important game of the series and we got to come out um with the same mindset what did you make of the late pj play today that's what we brought him here for you know I mean like the extra possessions the shot making in the corners uh his defense um that's the reason why he's on our team you know I mean can you talk about that second morning today um just trying to be aggressive they they double double team enjoy so you know I mean somebody else got to make shots and be aggressive and you know just just put the work in you live with the results and I make some shots you mentioned adjustments you know both teams will make adjustments would you be surprised that they came out and doubled joelle again like they did today well wait we'll wait and see I mean I can't I can't tell you you know I mean I mean I mean he's the mvp so it's like you know would you rather him scoring 40 or you know I mean living with us making shots and either way it's fine you know I mean like so we'll be ready for either way you talk about talking about how big your body you feel on your side you think about that yeah uh I mean I couldn't make a layup but that's the least of my worries uh but yeah I mean my legs my body feels just just powerful feel strong you know I mean like there's a stint where I played I think 13 minutes straight from the end of the first quarter 12 minutes then the whole second quarter and I felt really good you know I mean so uh the work that I put in and this is the you know this is the reason for it historically last question change historically this team has struggled in the playoffs whenever joelle hits the bench obviously you guys had great minutes today and have been coming on down the stretch I guess what's allowing you to have more success um you know I've just docking you know myself just on the same page in a sense of in that second unit who's out there who's going to be who's going to be playing on the court and what we're trying to accomplish you know I mean we can't make it too difficult we got to make it easy and knowing we're trying to accomplish and I think that group will melt and jay mack and and george and p reed um you know we get it obviously everything isn't going to be great but defensively we have to get stops and then offensively um as much space as we can you know I mean that I'll do all the work and guys should be ready to shoot and make plays to finish and um you know tonight was a great great you know example of that and that unit is going to be extremely key you know I mean like start the second quarter start the fourth quarters that's a big that's a big part of the game and if we can manage and and be even or even take the lead you know then we that's a bonus for us so uh tonight was a great start for us and we got to be even better game too thanks champ appreciate you doc talked about the way you guys used the ball around especially from james you got three guys scoring 20 points including yourself can you talk about how you guys how the offense flowed with the ball around the way it did i just thought we did a good job of kind of um what was presented to us uh early on the double teams off of joel um him him just making quick decisions and getting rid of it and allowing us uh to to just make them make decisions right like quick closeouts shooting threes um so when that ball's hopping around like that everybody is in a flow and a rhythm and um it's tough to guard and you know more times than not we're getting good looks and just with joel and james presence out there for creating a few double teams uh on a perimeter um that just opened up the game for everybody we were able to make shots doc talked about the accuracy of the passes this week you guys were focusing on that did you notice the difference that that really helped during the week yeah i mean um you know it was the emphasis of just you know making on target passes to shooters and being ready to shoot everybody on this team um you know we we have a lot of guys who can shoot the three ball at a high clip um and when we get those open looks we just gotta let them go and um live with the results and um you know we did definitely do a lot of stuff this whole week on making sure we make great passes for looks and and knowing that that impacts a shooter every time on the floor so yeah he's dedicated to get in particular good job man do you feel like at this point in the season some of his tenants yeah i mean uh you know playoff basketball is just about every possession and um you know pj he gave us more possessions out there on the floor by crashing a glass and just being um you know physical out there his presence out there defensively as well so i think um you know five steals five offensive rebounds that's huge for us um and added possessions yeah you know they they add up at the end of the game and that was a a huge reason why we got extra looks and good looks as well you're talking about james's playmaking ability and then to be aggressive how much more comfortable is he now knowing the moments within the game of when to do what yeah i think he's very comfortable i think i think you saw tonight just the ability to you know make the threes especially out there and those are big shots for for our whole group and then outside of that with the second unit and paul reed they were able to have a lot of great plays out there just um you know making the other team make a decision on what they wanted to give up so he was huge for us all game all game last two seasons you've kind of fallen out of the spotlight second half of the season as an offensive player and then suddenly you know in the first tonight you kind of blossom and become the perfect version of yourself how do you kind of just suddenly snap into that into that mindset just taking advantage of the opportunities um when they presented to me um be aggressive you know be able to uh be sharp out there all season long i mean you know it's it's flows of of how we play and you know offensively you know the opportunities out there but it's just staying focused staying ready and being ready for the moment and tonight i was able to get a lot of great looks um the ball was flying around and was able to just get more opportunity and um you know i put that work in to be able to stay consistent stay efficient throughout the whole season no matter you know how many shots i get one game or the next game is just being ready for the moment and tonight you know in in the playoffs is you know when when you're gonna have like you know different different matchups that teams are presenting out there you know double teams different schemes and uh for me it's just staying in the moment and being aggressive with all opportunities that come my way and uh yeah i mean that that's really all i'm trying to do the guys you guys never would slow down mikhail business in the second half get 23 in the first half seven the second half what was the difference defensively from mikhail business from being out there on the floor just uh you know making his looks harder um i'm not about to get a whole game plan but you seen what he's doing out there i mean i bet he's you know he's a hell of a player and they run a lot of actions through him he was making a lot of tough shots contested shots um but for us as a group i mean that's going to be a huge emphasis for us uh going into game two of being ready to trying to stop them uh offensively because uh you know we know how good they are and um how many guys they got out there that could make plays but um you know he he was he was really good got going early on especially in the game but we had to do it we had to show a little bit different schemes defensively versus him to kind of slow up his looks can you get a sense whether this or if it doesn't mean more to james he's playing consistently i did you ask him i did not oh i don't i don't honestly i i don't think he cares that much to be honest i think he's just trying to do whatever he can to to help our team win um now you talked about like the strength of how he looks on the floor and you are seeing that that that explosion into the step back and you know the way that he's moving out there but i think it's less about you know his other team and more about the group that he's with yes sir thank you everybody when you look at shooting 63 percent from the field six to 12 from downtown what areas did you see um this game take a different direction yeah interesting uh obviously you saw a game plan of not letting joel get off early he had seven shot attempts at halftime uh so strategy check good uh then i think you have to look at the shots that were made whether that was two pull-up transitions not transition but two off the bounce pull-ups from tobias great shot you pat him on the back for that james had three at the end of the shot clock pat him on the back great for that so uh overall adjustments um will continue to make uh i think for us when i look at the stat sheet i just look at the shot discrepancy you know it's been a problem for us all year uh so twofold the turnovers we should be turning them over not us turning the basketball over but hopefully they'll be calling travel and three seconds on the big fella next game so i'll look forward to that and uh and then for us uh we gotta shoot threes and so uh that comes with getting the rebound so we had some initial stops they got offensive rebounds some of them long bounces part of basketball some of them where we gotta hit somebody about the rebounding earlier about it being a main point of emphasis when you look at how they're able to get the offensive glass and get those 21 second chance points how did you see them able to capitalize off of that it is uh definitely multiple effort this time of the year you have to have multiple efforts and so it goes from your traditional spacing on the defensive end because you trap and beat now you're rotating now you can need another effort uh to stop the penetration then go after the rebound so it is just given multiple efforts we just got to get that in our brain that that's what it's going to take in this series uh it's not going to be traditional um we got to mix things up take some risks and we did that tonight i mean they came into the game i think the top three point shooting team in the league after the all-star break so assuming you know you're going to double joel there's probably be some looks for them you were prepared to live with i guess how many of the three-point shooting their three-point i think overall if you take away i mean it'd be interesting to watch the game again but when you take away the you know the ones made off the offensive rebounds those uh if we take care of the offensive rebound those you can you know take out the equation um pj made a corner three then then you take ones to buy us off the bounce three uh he made it with a contest over spencer uh the james 29 footer then one off the bounce with three seconds on the clock that's just part of basketball you pat him on the back and say good shot so we have to be disciplined enough that the shots that we want to give up because of game plan wise those are okay but the extra effort the you got to make this play somehow you got to come up with the basketball we need this possession those are the ones that hurt and have momentum for paul reed to come in and have the impact that he did just what did you see that allowed him to kind of just like get away from you guys i think that unit it is uh james focused and so uh maybe our attention and a few possessions was on james he got a couple offensive rebounds he got a drop off uh and so i think his baskets have to be contested all of those um but the focus is still going to be on james and in that group and the shooters in that group spencer with some of his alleys where they were a little high just what did you see and do you have to tell him anything or do you know that he's just going to get himself together no i i told him i take the odds of him uh completing those i've seen it done before and i've seen him do it at a high level uh so um i said to him doing one of the timeouts that the odds are in your favor we're going you know connect on a few of these uh the good thing is our bigs are getting to the rim it is available um that's the difference between sometimes scrimmaging during the week and giving you guys off a little time to recover during the week you just don't get that timing a little bit throughout the course of the week yeah i thought that you know the game just slowed down the second half a little bit and that was the biggest difference for us we have to keep this thing fast paced and it starts with stops i thought he had a great first half for us setting tone really getting to his spots uh showed an array of shots uh it's it's on me to continue to get the ball to him and also continue to have pace uh whether or not bogging him down and holding him and uh grabbing and letting him not play with freedom of movement and the second man within beat obviously you mentioned the strategy you guys had devil liam was it just a matter of him getting those looks in the second that got him going or was what well that's the uh the discipline the consistency that you're going to need for four quarters and so uh for us we were able to be on time uh with some of our traps at the beginning of the game we still got to be on time in the third and the fourth quarter uh what he did do is re-establish himself whether it was trying to repose or re-establish at the top of the key once he gave it up those are the ones we need to take away from it and make it tougher for him to catch so everything has to be challenged for him there's nothing that we won't allow to be easy for uh for especially those two yeah it's just um when we go lineups having uh joe seth dayron sharp uh in at the same time uh we tried some zone we also uh have to be in a position where we can rebound with that group uh so it's really just mixing and messing getting mikhail cj spencer in there with one of those uh so that now we're not loaded too heavy with those three at the same time do you think it was nervousness or fatigue for the missed shots and the turnovers i don't think our guys were nervous at all i mean i felt good about uh going into the game uh they showed me throughout the course of the game that we belong here so that part of it was really good we got to get more looks i don't think we have enough threes to get up and so a big part of that is you got to shoot the ball you can't turn it over and you got to get the rebound so uh really pleased with our group in the sense of they're ready to play we'll make some adjustment we'll be ready for game two have you given any explanation without reaching into your checkbook as to why royce got that t equal opportunity i think it was they wanted to get one to one guy so they give it to another guy if they were to call the out of bounds first then we wouldn't have got to that play that's not gonna get me fined is it alex if it is i'm giving it to you joy was out of bounds on that play anyway then we got to the altercation the way mikhail is able to get his offense is not like what we saw the first half of the season where you had a lot of iso sets but he's able to kind of just come off screens or not even have the ball in his hands and end up with a mid-range look just is that is are you guys able to do that because the speed that you want to play at is that is the speed helping facilitate some of the areas of the scoring well i think it's a few things at that time probably as a coach was trying to establish what he could do uh could he play some isolation basketball could that be something we can go to at the end of a game i think in this series with pj garden m pj is extremely strong wants to grab he wants to hold him so we want to have mikhail play in space and play with freedom so trying to free him up to play him some space that's really how he got a bunch of those off the off the kind of catch and go a little bit quickly following up on that i mean pj is not a guy who's going to score a lot of points but can you just talk about what type of impact he's going to have on the series yeah so his is going to be the rebounding piece and so uh at the end of the day some of our traps the basketball uh he ended up being in that you know dunker spot underneath the rim and he was able to hurt us a little bit on on the glass so um you know it's they'll have the choice of whether they're they want pj to shoot that thing whether they want pj underneath the bucket if we can get the rebound then that's one extra guy underneath the bucket we can go to the other end so it all it's all gonna boil down to us rebounding the basketball uh and getting stops and running to the other end how much of the defensive rebounding issues for you guys do chalk up to effort and how much of it was struggling to get on the glass after sort of flying around and rotating off of those double teams yeah it's kind of what i said you're not in your traditional spots once you start flying around right and so a ball goes off maybe one guy who had just closed out now he's got to turn the opposite direction and hit a body on the other side and said the dude that's right next to him just because the ball is shot from the other direction from which he flew so that combination uh but it's going to take that kind of effort the long rebounds where niang ends up shooting the three somehow some way we got to come up with it that's just what it is i love it though that is just what it is you got it when you look at this one i look at this the statute overall after success you guys were able to find efficiency on the offensive side of things being efficient in that first half what do you what did you see as like the biggest difference maker overall oh boards and uh three-point attempts and three-point makes um you know it they shot 19 more times than us it's hard to beat a team when they shoot 19 more times than you they make 21 threes and come with 14 offensive rebounds it's just it makes it a lot harder specifically defensively that they adjusted or changed that kind of gave you guys the most struggle no i mean i thought we were getting to our spots getting shots we wanted maybe playing late in the shot clock a little bit too much but um you know we need to get stopped so we can get out and run and play with pace um anytime you're letting up offensive rebounds and they're scoring the ball i'm at a high rate we're playing against the set set defense chewing chewing time off the clock so those are just areas that we need to improve in and uh you know the good thing about it's a series we'll go back and we'll adjust and make the changes we need to cam with the offensive rebound how what what do you think the issue was was just more of their um when you when you're doubling and uh rotating a lot it becomes a little bit harder to box out so we just have to have a continued high attention to to guys crashing putting bodies on them i think it's physical it's physical and and sometimes they're coming in clear and you just you just got to take a hit give a hit whatever it is um but definitely an area i can be better for sure um you know pj kind of just lingers around in that dunker spot and you're ready to rotate next you know he's right you know upside you so uh definitely an area for improvement i think we did improve throughout the game i mean the rebounding margin ended up being three overall um so we were down bad early so i thought you know we made some bit of an adjustment to uh less than that supporting cast was going to get good um you got to understand personnel and where guys like to shoot from where they don't um you know i think we can just do a better job making guys that you know knowing where guys want to shoot and don't want to shoot from instead of giving them the ones that they feel comfortable with um but 21 threes a lot of threes and making a ball game for sure why do you think paul reed um just a different look than joel um they're coming in he's he's sitting same thing in the dunker you know break down the the point of attack defender and and draw the help and give it to him for dump boss but you know he's an energy guy um high offensive rebounder so we just got to be a little bit more alert for what he does in the game were you injured on the earlier charge did you need to step up intensity after that was i there the charge earlier in the game the one that i took um was that was that was i okay after that yeah i was completely fine i was completely fine after that um you know just just trying to beat him to a spot and take a hit these guys are physical they're strong um so i knew he was going to try to just kind of give me a shoulder so i just took it all good you know easy do you think that there's something the team can do to force more turnovers and get out in transition or was some of it just luck because you did have a lot of deflections today that didn't end up being live ball turnovers yeah it's combination that's just how the game goes um yeah a lot of a lot of hands on balls that just wound up working out even better for them um but hopefully we can turn those into steals um you know maybe just trying to jump them um being aggressive on those rotations um and uh understanding who we're guarding and where we're guarding them on the court but you know we'll definitely look in these next couple games to uh turn them over more because they had eight we had 19 again it's it's these you know the stat sheet kind of paints a picture you know we we made shots when we needed to but too high a turnover too many offensive rebounds and shot discrepancy is a big difference in that game thanks camp thanks