Joel Embiid reacts to his big return after Sixers beat Heat in Game 3

PHILADELPHIA — The Philadelphia 76ers were in a very tough situation on Friday as they returned home to host the Miami Heat down 0-2 in their Eastern Conference semifinal series. They played the first two games without superstar big man Joel Embiid as he was working through a concussion and an orbital fracture.

The big fella returned on Friday and he didn’t have a huge offensive game as he had 18 points on 5-for-12 shooting and 11 rebounds, but the impact on the floor was huge. The Heat weren’t able to get into the paint as easily as they did in Games 1 and 2 and that was a huge difference in this game.

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Philadelphia held Miami to 35.1% shooting ad they were just 7-for-30 from deep as the Sixers were able to handle them relatively easy in this one.

After the 99-79 win, Embiid reacted to his game and how the Sixers were able to get this done.

“I’m OK. I feel pretty good.”

“It was a struggle. Really because of the concussion and dealing with a bunch of symptoms, but I’m glad it went away and I’m glad that I’m back.”

“They cleared me yesterday (Thursday) and today obviously was still seeing how I feel. Especially, after working out yesterday so it was really about seeing if there was gonna be any sort of reaction or if I was gonna have any sort of symptoms from the concussion, but it was fine.”

“I didn’t think I had a lot of energy, honestly. I was really trying to really get through it and kinda just use my presence out there as a decoy. I feel like what I pride myself on is really defensively and I feel that’s where my presence is really felt on the defensive end so that’s one of the main reasons why playing I thought I could have a huge impact.”

“It was very annoying. Obviously, we didn’t make shots, but we also made a lot of mistakes whether it was offensive rebounding or turnovers. Their big fella, Bam (Adebayo), he was dominating and I was really pissed off watching their other big man go play well against my team, but it’s unfortunate. Can’t take it back so we gotta just focus on the next game.”

“For sure. Down 2-0, I had to do really everything possible to be out there no matter really how much how I was feeling. I’m just glad we got the win.”

“If we would’ve been 2-0, I’m not sure. Obviously, that gives me more time to get back to myself, but these fractures, they’re not gonna heal for a couple weeks so it’s really not gonna change anything in my life if I played now or in Game 4 so I think it’s about doing whatever is possible to protect it as much as possible.”

“I air-balled a wide-open shot so that’s the answer to that question, but it’s whatever. It’s just the circumstances. Four years ago, I really complained about it. It’s a little different this year because I don’t have to wear goggles. Those were really annoying whether it was the reflection of the lights was still bothering me. This time around, it’s still a big adjustment, but like I said, it starts on defense, and on defense, I don’t really need to see everything. Obviously, on offense, you need to really be able to see to try and knock down shots, but it’s fine.”

“Nah. When it happened, obviously we figured out what really happened, I didn’t think about it. I just thought about what I was gonna do to make sure I was back at any point in the series whether it was Game 1 or Game 2 or Game 3 or Game 4, I was just doing whatever possible to try and come back.”