After another blowout win on Wednesday, Sixers big man Joel Embiid had yet another night where he didn’t play a full allotment of minutes. The MVP candidate saw just 25 minutes (34 points on 10-for-17 shooting) in the win over the Rockets.
“I think it’s good and it’s not because I want to play as much as I can,” Embiid told FortyEightMinutes and other media after the game. “Just to make sure that I’m ready for the load in the playoffs. When we get there, I’m gonna have to play 36-38 minutes a game. I just want to make sure that I’m also ready.”
During the Sixers’ current six-game winning streak, Embiid has seen just 27.5 minutes per game. In games where he’s not seeing a full workload, he’s making sure to do extra conditioning.
“When we have games like that…when we get back, I gotta do my own conditioning,” Embiid said. “…We got a couple blowouts, but that’s hard to do in the playoffs. You want to kind of get to the playoffs just kind of like upping your lungs. You just got to play more minutes.”
The Sixers have just six games remaining in the regular season and with a two-game lead for the top spot in the Eastern Conference, the franchise is in the driver’s seat for the No. 1 seed in the conference. Regular-season success is nice but what really matters is how they perform come playoff time and Embiid readying himself for the NBA’s second season is a major part of that calculus.
