All season long, the Philadelphia 76ers struggled to keep teams off the offensive glass. They surrendered 12.1 second-chance opportunities per game. That ranked 27th in the league. It also led to giving up 15.8 second-chance points per tilt. That also ranked in the bottom seven. They're now in a first-round rivalry clash against a team with a penchant for producing offensive rebounds.
To the Sixers' credit, the Boston Celtics haven't enjoyed a pronounced advantage in that category on the margins. The latter only generated two more second-chance points in the series opener. They had three more in Game 2 and five more in the following matchup. That changed appreciably in Boston's 128-96 victory in Game 4. Playing in the "City of Brotherly Love," the visitors grabbed 14 offensive rebounds, parlaying them into an 18-9 edge in second-chance points.
However, beyond the Celtics' decisive advantage in a win that gave them a 3-1 series lead, there were timely offensive rebounds from Derrick White in their Game 3 victory. His ability to twice retrieve the miss in crunch-time resulted in a pair of baskets, including a dagger 3 from Jayson Tatum, that helped swing the outcome.
In Game 5, Tyrese Maxey took action
The 76ers still struggled to limit the Celtics to one shot per possession. However, the 15 offensive rebounds they yielded only led to a 10-9 edge in second-chance points for Boston.
Along with continuing to lock in after giving up offensive rebounds, there was an exemplary display of leadership from Tyrese Maxey. The Sixers' star guard grabbed 10 defensive rebounds. That was a team-high in their 113-97 win to save their season.
After doing so, the soon-to-be All-NBA selection explained what was at the heart of his performance on the defensive glass.
"I'm just tired of giving up rebounds," stated Maxey. "I'm just tired of it. I'm just tired of giving up rebounds, man. It's not a good feeling. We play really good defense. A lot of these times that we give up these rebounds, even today, it was a couple of times, like, man, it's just like we play so hard defensively. Like we've got to reward ourselves."
His ability to take matters into his own hands on Tuesday helped force a Game 6 in the "City of Brotherly Love."
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