Doc Rivers Does Not Regret Leaving Joel Embiid in Long Enough to Get Hurt

Doc Rivers has spent the week explaining the unexplainable. First he was asked about his teams having a tough time closing out series, which he says is actually proof of what a good job he's done. Today the press asked him about the decision to have Joel Embiid in at the end of a blowout win where he broke a bone in his face that will keep him out for who knows how long. Rivers also had an answer for that which was basically everybody else was doing it!

"The other team had all their guys in too. In the last five minutes of the game. We made the run the last minute of that game right before that. That's when we got up 29. After Joel made that shot he did the airplane. Watch the game, I turned and said let's get, I'm calling a timeout the next posession."

Rivers continued, arguing that every team would do the same thing, but it doesn't matter. Anytime a superstar is in late in a blowout people wonder why he's still in there. Embiid got hurt so the rules of hindsight say that Rivers was wrong.

Especially when he tries to make it sound like the Sixers made some kind of run to suddenly put the game out of reach. Philadelphia was up 21 going into the fourth quarter and the Raptors never got closer than 18 less than a minute into the quarter. Embiid scored with 8:31 left in the fourth to put Philly up 26. Embiid also made it a 26 point game with 7:29 remaining and a 27 point game with 6:49 left on the clock.

But that's not all!

Georges Niang made a jumper with 5:46 remaining to make it a 28 point game! And then Tobias Harris stretched it back to 27 with 4:34 to go.

Look, if Doc isn't comfortable until it became a 10 posession game with 4:10 remaining, well, everyone was just giving him shit about his teams blowing leads on a big stage. So maybe it's their fault. It certainly isn't Doc's.