Tyrese Maxey has his signature moment, saving 76ers in Madison Square Garden

NEW YORK — Tyrese Maxey has made that shot before.

He’s made it in the gym in the summer at home in Dallas. He’s made it at arenas around the NBA. He’s made it while getting in reps working on the pick-and-roll. He has made that shot countless times before. But he has never made it at Madison Square Garden. Not in New York. Not with his season just seconds away from falling into the abyss. Not with some 20,000 fans frothing to see him fail. Feasting on it. Dreaming of the second round. No, living it already.

Tyrese Maxey made that shot. He made it with 8.2 seconds left. Pulled up from the logo, his feet square on the ‘E’ in New York at center court before he rose up. Made an entire arena groan in unison. Made it and then thought about all the times Philadelphia 76ers assistant coach Rico Hines told him to shoot it from deep; now, he finally did.

“It’s a good moment to see your work come to light,” he said after his team’s 112-106 win, narrowing the Knicks’ series lead to 3-2.

HIM. pic.twitter.com/Zs38RDxiEs

— Philadelphia 76ers (@sixers) May 1, 2024

The brightest lights. The kind that have blinded so many others before him. Not Maxey, though. Not Tuesday night, in an elimination game when the 76ers were already all but done. The Sixers needed him. They had Joel Embiid, but he was faltering, even on a night when he amassed a triple-double out of sheer persistence. This time, the reigning NBA MVP wasn’t enough. They needed Maxey, the team’s happy warrior, who smiles at nearly every moment, only to rain down F-bombs on MSG in pure, unbridled exuberance.

By then, Maxey could do whatever he wanted. He had just sent Game 5 into overtime, a turn so unexpected and so chaotic it could only happen in this series. The 76ers had thrown Game 2 away with a disastrous last-minute collapse. It gnawed at them, but they moved on. In Game 5, it was their turn to be resurrected.

It was Maxey who brought them back from the dead. Down 96-90 with 28.2 seconds left in the fourth quarter, he scored seven points in 17 seconds to snuff out extinction, and then five more in overtime. Down 3-1, he scored 46 points and dropped nine assists in a performance that will live on for years to come.

Game 6 of this brutal and beautiful series is Thursday and who knows what to expect. These first five games have played out like a cage match: exhausting, intricate and overwhelming in their physical decadence.

But Tuesday night will always be remembered as the Tyrese Maxey Game. Such was his brilliance that he layered on a new coat of trauma for the untold Knicks fans who had grown cocky with every win this month and every bucket. It had put the Knicks so close to the next round. They had earned it, too. The Knicks have been unrelenting this season and even more so in this series, swarming Embiid and the Sixers so viciously to take a 3-1 lead. Somehow, Jalen Brunson, a 6-foot-2 bulldozer, had taken control and he refused to cede it back.

Maxey has lived in Embiid’s shadow all season long. He took on the mantle of his new sidekick when the Sixers traded James Harden in November and did it so well he earned an All-Star nod of his own. Yet, this series has swung with Embiid as the pendulum. Philadelphia has won the minutes he was out there and strained to triage the ones he wasn’t.

Embiid struggled in Game 5 and that brought on new problems. Embiid’s final line — 19 points, 16 rebounds, 10 assists, five blocks and nine turnovers — belied his showing. His balky left knee continued to limit his movement. He missed shootaround with migraines and still looked a step slow at times during the game. He missed 12 of 19 shots and earned just six free throws.

That forced Maxey to step up. He had labored for this moment. His father raised him by a creed he took seriously: that proper preparation prevents poor performance. 

But even that confidence can waver. Maxey missed three free throws — uncharacteristic for an 87-percent shooter — and turned the ball over. He needed soothing, and when Buddy Hield took to him on the bench, he gave him a message, too. He reminded Maxey that he knew just how vast his powers were, enough to make up for his mistakes.

Maxey was nearly unstoppable, even against the tight Knicks’ defense. He broke it down off the dribble, cutting lanes to the rim and using his speed as a warning to create space to launch 3s, hitting seven of them. With Embiid off, he took on that burden.

“That’s big time,” Sixers guard Cameron Payne said. “The best thing I can say is, man, it’s just the beginning for him. He made incredible shots. He’s incredible player — (an) All-Star. I think it’s just the beginning for him. He need to keep being that aggressive.”

The Sixers have stayed on him to do that all year. Coach Nick Nurse made it one of his objectives when he was hired last summer. He poked and prodded Maxey to keep seeking more. He saw the relationship as symbiotic: The more Maxey eats, the better off the Sixers are, too.

It all clicked at a time the Sixers could afford nothing else. The Garden crowd feared Embiid and reviled him, serenading the star with “F— Embiid” chants throughout the night, but it was the All-Star they forgot who smited them. He baited Knicks center Mitchell Robinson into a foul on a 3 with 25.1 seconds left and the Knicks down six. Maxey made it for a four-point play.

After a made free throw by Josh Hart, he broke the Knicks again and pulled up from 35 feet away, slithering around an Embiid screen just inside the half-court line just quickly enough to lose Miles McBride and avoid a foul that would have sent him to the line instead. Seven points in 17 seconds — part of his 17 in the fourth. Then a 3 to once again pull the Sixers from the brink in overtime, breaking a 5-0 Knicks run to start the overtime, which sent Philadelphia on to the win, just barely — but that’s enough.

“Mandatory,” said Maxey, who played all but 66 seconds of the game. Only New York’s Josh Hart, who never sat, played more. “We had to. Season on the line.”

Now, this outing will have a lore of its own. Madison Square Garden affords that kind of stage and Maxey was its star. Afterward, he heard about Reggie Miller’s legendary performance here nearly 29 years ago to the day, when eight points in 8.9 seconds became its own kind of calling card. It was a long time ago, Maxey said. He’d need to go and watch it some more.

His performance Tuesday will bring out those echoes, too, one day. He’ll always have this night. The Tyrese Maxey Game will live on for a while. But it was one that was a long time coming, too, built on the work that came before the shot that trumpeted his arrival on a national stage.

As Maxey walked out of Madison Square Garden and into the tunnel down to the street, his jacket held a reminder. In all red stitching across black fabric, it simply read, “Good things are coming.”

GO DEEPER

Knicks have a way to make sure nobody talks about Tyrese Maxey's magic: Win!

(Photo of Maxey: Elsa / Getty Images)