The Philadelphia 76ers grabbed a huge victory over the Boston Celtics on Wednesday thanks to Joel Embiid’s heroics, who dropped 42 points with 17 of them coming from the free-throw line.
The Boston Celtics guard Marcus Smart told reporters after the game that Joel Embiid flailed a lot during Wednesday’s night game.
(via NBC Sports):
“It’s tough, especially when we’ve got our hands up a lot of the time and he flails and he gets the call,” Smart said. “And then down on the other end, we’ve got our guys attacking the rim, getting a lot of contact, and we’re just not getting the whistle. It’s tough to play like that. It’s tough.”
Embiid is one of the best bigs taking advantage of his inferior ability to draw contact around the basket. The 76ers’ All-Star center takes 9.8 attempts per from the free-throw line making 83.9% of them.
The vast majority of his points are coming from the line this season (31.2%), and Embiid is finding a way to preserve his energy through the game.
“Marcus Smart just told me that I flail a lot? Come on,” Embiid said. “I’m sure he knows himself and he knows his game, too. He does a lot of that.”
“And I don’t think I do (flail). If you watch basketball and if you’re a student of the game and if you actually pay attention during the game, we all see every single foul, I get fouled,” the center from Cameroon continued.
“The game is physical. Other teams tend to try to be extra physical against me and I guess I’m just smarter than everybody else — I just take advantage of it. I just take advantage of how they’re guarding me.”
