Why 76ers will pull off yet another massive upset by beating Knicks in 2026 NBA Playoffs

With the 2026 NBA season on the line, the Philadelphia 76ers flew into Boston and gave the two-seed Celtics the business, handing a Jayson Tatum-less team their fourth L of the series and an early trip to Cancun to begin their summer.

With basically no room for error following an ugly Game 4 loss at home, Joel Embiid led his team to three straight wins to close things out in Massachusetts, opening the door for the next revenge series in Round 2 against the New York Knicks, who bumped Philadelphia from the postseason in 2024 in a hotly contested seven-game series.

Will it be easy for the 76ers to take down the Eastern Conference third seed as a seven seed, having to win at least one game on the road at Maddison Square Garden? No, but there are multiple advantages the 76ers can exploit to make things easy and maybe check another item off of Embiid’s list as he takes another shot at bringing an NBA Championship back to the City of Brotherly Love.

Nick Nurse can optimize Joel Embiid’s usage vs. KAT and Robinson

Despite finishing the 2026 regular season with the second-best record in the Eastern Conference, the Celtics didn’t exactly employ a roster built to win a championship, with their center tandem of Luka Garza, Neemias Queta, and Nikola Vukavic hardly built to take on a former MVP playing just a tick under his absolute prime.

The Knicks, however, have a very different collection of players, with the dynamic duo of Karl-Anthony Towns and Mitchell Robinson presenting a near-constant challenge for Embiid on both ends of the court.

While Towns has been the butt of more than a few jokes during the postseason for one reason or another, he is still very much a talented offensive weapon who can record a triple-double in a game where he only takes seven shots. His ability to stretch the field from the five spot creates the potential for mismatches all over the field, and his ability to dish to open teammates makes things all the more challenging from a defensive perspective, especially for a team like the 76ers who like to deploy their big man in drop coverage.

And as for Robinson? Well, he’s a defensive specialist who can set great screens and dunk the ball with the best of them, giving opposing centers a tough time for every minute he’s on the court.

So far this playoff run, the Knicks have played Towns an average of 31.8 minutes of action per game, versus just 13.8 for  Robinson, but they did experiment more with both players on the court together late in the Hawks series with positive results. With Embiid probable to start in Game 1, the Knicks will likely try to put Robinson on him as often as possible to slow “The Process” down. The 76ers can counter that by keeping Embiid on KAT as often as possible and giving him a rest when only Robinson is on the court, since he’s less of a scoring threat.

Dominick Barlow can be a factor after barely playing vs. Boston

During the 76ers’ seven-game series against the Celtics, Barlow only played more than ten minutes of action twice, in Game 1 and in Game 3. He was a DNP in Game 3 and Game 6, one with Embiid and one without him, and he only shot the ball seven times, making one in Game 1 in a brutal losing effort.

Because Barlow isn’t exactly a floor spacer, completing just 25.6 percent of his 1.2 shots per game from beyond the arc, his number has only been called sparingly in the playoffs because of his lack of deep accuracy, with more traditional two-way players like Quentin Grimes, Paul George, and Kelly Oubre Jr. instead filling out the majority of the wing snaps.

If the Knicks opt to stick to one center lineups for the vast majority of the series against the 76ers, then Barlow likely won’t get much action in the second round either. But if the Knicks opt to put Robinson and KAT on the court together in order to give Embiid the hardest time possible, Barlow could be a factor as a way to limit the load placed on Embiid against New York’s bigs.

Part of why Barlow was such a regular season success story was that he had a willingness to put his body on the line and do all of the dirty work that would put unnecessary strain on Embiid. He’d rebound relentlessly on both ends of the court, run in for the easy bucket on the cut, and fire the ball back to the 76ers’ shooters who had a better chance of getting the ball in the hoop.

Is Barlow a certified difference maker for the 76ers in the second round? No, he almost certainly won’t be, but when Nurse is running a seven-man rotation where Maxey and Edgecombe are playing over 40 minutes of action on the regular, eating up a few minutes when Robinson is on the court could help to optimize other players’ efficiency in non-elimination situations.

The 76ers can hunt Jalen Brunson on defense

In their first round series against the Celtics, Nurse has six players who saw the court for at least 20 minutes per game, their starters plus sixth man Quentin Grimes, who can play 1-3 depending on what Nurse needs on any given possession.

While such a guard-heavy rotation with three players 6-foot-5 or shorter could create some mismatches on defense for a team like the Knicks who have a pair of quality forwards in OG Anunoby and Mikal Bridges, it does present a golden opportunity for the 76ers to attack New York’s worst defender, Jalen Brunson, possession after possession in a variety of different ways.

So far this playoff run, Brunson has a DBPM of -0.7, which is actually an improvement from his -0.9 DBPM during the regular season. CJ McCollum scored over 20 points in each of the Hawks’ first three games against the Knicks, and while they were able to slow him down offensively down the stretch, the 76ers have far more offensive firepower to throw Brunson’s way every minute he’s on the court.

Considering Brunson has a massive usage rate of 30.4 so far in the playoffs, if the 76ers go out of their way to target him on defense, it will limit the amount of energy he has to deploy on offense and will thus limit the effectiveness of New York’s primary offensive engine.

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