Sixers 116, Bulls 96: After a sleep start, the Sixers occupy business

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THE SCORE OF THE BOX

It was a bit of an early sleep, but once the Sixers woke up, it was not good for the Bulls.

The Sixers broke their three-game losing streak and managed to get out of business during a 116-96 win at the Amway Center on Saturday night.

With the win, the magic number to win the third seed of the Eastern Conference is one. The Celtics' loss against Magic Sunday would do the trick.

This is also the 50th win for the Sixers, ensuring two consecutive seasons of 50 wins for the first time since 1984-1985 and 1985-1986.

Jimmy Butler (back contraction) missed his second consecutive game.

Here are the observations of the victory.

• It was a decision to make at the time of the match, but Joel Embiid played his 64th game Saturday, the highest mark of his young career. It's great to see how things started and the injury problems he experienced.

It started a little slowly, but once the Sixers told him about it later in the second quarter, he started to impose his will. This helped the Sixers turn a point deficit into an eight-point lead at halftime. He had 14 points on 7 of 11 shots at halftime. He finished with 20 points, 10 rebounds, five assists and three blocks in 27 minutes.

• It was a weird first half for Ben Simmons. He was efficient, scoring eight points and making 4 of 6 shots, more than he had in the entire Milwaukee match. It seemed like he had left more opportunities. This is the type of team on which he should feast. The Bulls have no one who can compete with his athleticism and no real rim protector. It almost looks like he's a little shy at the moment.

You had to like this finish, which he made with his "left hand".

There also seems to be something special about the Embiid-Simmons couple. We did not see it against the Bucks, but the chemistry appeared in this one.

Simmons had 14 points, four rebounds and four assists.

• Perhaps the biggest shame of the Sixers' recent losses – aside from the losses themselves – is the performance of JJ Redick that they squandered. He has been fantastic in his last 15 games with an average of 19.2 points and a 45% lead over the top three. He finished with 23 points, a top in the team, 4 out of 7 and 8 out of 12 in total.

He also made this ridiculous move.

It's amazing how he regularly hits like that. How many guys in the league can? If this is the Redick version, the Sixers enter the playoffs, that would be a huge boost.

• None of the rescue centers made an inspiring effort on the defensive side, but both looked good on each other. Boban Marjanovic struggled to keep veteran Robin Lopez in front of him, but he was still as efficient as he usually was, scoring 10 points on 4 out of 5 shots. Jonah Bolden sometimes struggled to play more at four points. but he showed enough to make Brett Brown feel comfortable playing the rookie and allowing Tobias Harris to slip into the playoff wings. He also hit three three.

Newcomer Greg Monroe saw his first action as Sixer. He recorded nine points in 10 minutes.

• Sam Hinkie's curse was alive and although Process Sixer, JaKarr Sampson, had a difficult start to the season. He had 17 points on 6 out of 10 of the field before half-time. He finished with a career high of 29 points and was the only reason why the Bulls were in this match at all times. Our only friend, Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot, had 14 points.

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