Vj Edgecombe made his NBA postseason debut Wednesday and looked anything but overwhelmed. The 20-year-old guard scored 19 points on 16 shots and grabbed 11 rebounds as the Sixers beat the Orlando Magic in a Play-In Tournament game that sent Philadelphia into the playoffs.
Tyrese Maxey finished the job late with 11 fourth-quarter points, but Edgecombe’s first playoff game was the jolt that stood out. He had one of his best rim finishes of the season in a critical moment, and no one on the floor pulled down more rebounds than he did. Nick Nurse said Edgecombe’s early minutes were “a little wild,” but added that he “played great in other aspects” and “really impacted the game,” calling it “really good for him to get that one under his belt.”
That mattered because the Sixers entered the postseason without a timeline for Joel Embiid after his emergency appendectomy last week, and with Maxey carrying the offense as the head of the snake for the foreseeable future. Philadelphia was scheduled to open its first-round series with the Boston Celtics on Sunday afternoon, and the kind of help Edgecombe gave against Orlando was exactly what the Sixers need around their stars.
Paul George, who has taken Edgecombe under his wing over the last several months, said the rookie’s rebounding was no accident against a Magic team built to punish mistakes on the glass. Orlando was a big group, George said, and its front three crashed the offensive boards. Edgecombe, he said, needed to have a presence from the guard position to help the Sixers rebound, and he delivered with 11 of them. George called that “extremely” impressive and said the attention to detail was the bigger point. “He knew that this is a heavy crash team. He knew that he needed to be there and have a presence from the guard position to come in and help us rebound,” George said.
Edgecombe made no secret of his approach either. “I ain't scared of nobody. I'mma be honest. I'm gonna guard regardless of who you is I'mma try. And I ain't scared, I ain't gonna back up if you're running at me. You just gotta run me over or something man,” he said. For a team that may need its youngest rotation piece to do more than just survive the moment, that edge is part of the story now. The Sixers have their playoff berth, and Edgecombe has already shown he can belong in the middle of it.
