DALLAS — The Philadelphia 76ers welcomed their star big man back to the lineup on Thursday after a one-game absence. Joel Embiid missed the team’s win over the Miami Heat to begin this five-game road trip due to left foot soreness, but he returned on Thursday in the team’s loss to the Dallas Mavericks.
Embiid had 35 points on 13-for-21 shooting and he pulled down eight rebounds in the loss to the Mavs. The foot issue has been bothering the big fella all season, and he decided to take the night off in Miami.
“I just thought I would get two days off and stay off of it,” said Embiid. “It usually feels much better after. So like I said, I just got to keep managing it and keep going.”
Along with Embiid returning to the lineup, the Sixers had Tyrese Maxey in the starting lineup. The Sixers moved Maxey to the bench on Jan. 15 to bolster that unit, but they had him start on Thursday. He had 29 points on 12-for-21 shooting.
“There’s more pace, but I think we got to get back to learning how to kind of play with each other to make sure that everything is balanced,” Embiid said of Maxey being in the starting lineup. “Not only offensively. I thought we were fine offensively.”
Philadelphia was fine offensively. They shot 57.7% and scored 126 points. When a team puts up that type of production, they should win on that night. However, the Mavericks received a combined 82 points from Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving.
“Defensively, obviously, with the two guys that take advantage of a lot of matchups, we struggled a lot,” Embiid added. “So we just got to do a better job as a team of just playing better team defense.”
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