After one week and four games between the Philadelphia 76ers and Miami Heat, we are no closer to determining a winner for this Eastern Conference semifinal series than when we started. The home teams have held serve across the first four games and what started as a best-of-seven series with Miami holding home-court advantage has now become a best-of-three with the Heat still holding the ball in their court.
However, one crucial difference exists from last week — Joel Embiid is available to take the floor from the jump. With a masked Embiid taking the court in Philadelphia after clearing concussion protocol and battling through his orbital fracture and torn thumb ligament injuries (I feel pained just typing that out), the Sixers have looked nothing like the squad that was forced to play DeAndre Jordan for 15 minutes per night (forced as in Doc Rivers made it so despite the protestations of everyone else who follows the team locally and nationally).