Just four days earlier, I had taken my final on sequences and series in calculus. I was still getting used to being back on Eastern time after spending three months in Evanston, Illinois, but that didn’t stop me from being in attendance for my one and only Sixers game of the highly anticipated 2019-20 season.
The Sixers were rolling with a record of 20-8, on pace to finish the season with just under 60 wins (given it would only be 60 wins in a normal, pandemic-less season). Sure, their road record of 6-8 was a tad concerning, and just three nights before they had been stomped by a Brooklyn Nets’ squad sans Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant, but on December 18 they were playing the Miami Heat.